If - Worlds Of Science Fiction v06n03 [Quinn] (Apr 1956) (AKv1.0)

ORLDS OF

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SCIENCE FIC

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,956t 35 CENTS

1

ATOMIC BOMBER — These giant needle-nosed delta wing A-bombers, atom-
powered aircraft of the future, are shown in combat practice eleven miles
above the earth's surface. The "attacking" craft is a supersonic jet inter-
ceptor. These great ships will likely be powered by air flowing through ducts
in their wings. Air will be expanded and ejected through rear jet nozzles at
terrific speed by means of intense heat from atomic reactor buried in heavy
shielding between wings. Despite shielding, crew in far-off nose will have
perhaps 36 flight hours without radiation injury. Such aircraft will be first
steps to adequate power for space flight. (Drawing by Mel Hunter)

ir

WORLDS of SCIENCE FICTION

APRIL 1956
All Stories New and Complete

Editor: JAMES L. QUINN

Assist. Editors: EVE WULFF, ROBERT W. GREENE

Art Editor: MEL HUNTER

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I 1

I NOVELETTES |

I HUMAN ERROR by Raymond F. Jones 4 |

I ATOM DRIVE by Charles Fontenay 56 |

1 CHROME PASTURES by Robert F. Young 72 |

I SHORT STORIES J

1 THE EXECUTIONER by Frank Riley 32 |

I LIFE HUTCH by Harlan Ellison 46 |

I LOVE STORY by Irving E. Cox, Jr. 98 |

II

FEATURES |

I THE ODD GENRE by Forrest J. Ackerman 2 |

I WHAT IS YOUR SCIENCE I.Q.? 113 |

I SCIENCE BRIEFS 115 |

I HUE AND CRY 117 |

I COVER: I

I By Kelly Freas, from "The Executioner" 1

5 E.

IF is published bi-monthly by Quinn Publishing Company, Inc. Volume 6, No. 3.
Copyright 1956 by Quinn Publishing Co., Inc. Office of publication, 8 Lord Street,
Buffalo, New York. Entered as Second Class Matter at Post Office, Buffalo, New
York. Subscription $3.50 for 12 issues in U.S. and Possessions; Canada $4 for 12
issues; elsewhere $4.50. Allow four weeks for change of address. All stories appear-
ing in this magazine are fiction; any similarity to actual persons is coincidental.
Not responsible for unsolicited artwork or manuscripts. 35c a copy. Printed in U.S.A.

EDITORIAL AND BUSINESS OFFICES, KINGSTON, NEW YORK

Next issue on sale April I2th

THE

genre

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I ENJOYED MYSELF recently at a
local (Los Angeles) Auto Show,
particularly observing the Gars of
the Future, the fibreglas sabres with
the fifth wheel for parking and
other strictly-from-sci-fi embellish-
ments, like the built-in hi-fi set, tele-
phone, and even mini-TV. With
the new emphasis on safety features,
Wendayne and I had been talking
at dinner, just before going to the
exhibit, about an idea of an inven-
tor friend of ours, namely wrap-
around bumpers protecting the side
of a car as well as the front; and
when we arrived at the show, lo!
what did we see but the demonstra-
tion of just such side-bumpers. And
then there was the $62,000 gold-
plated Cadillac — very far in my fu-
ture.

After which I went out to the
parking lot and kicked my new
Oldsmobile: so it had power steer-
ing, power braking, power windows,
power windshield wiping, power
radio antenna, power horn and
power cigaret lighter, what good
was the damn old thing? — it didn't

even have power handkerchief.
And long noses run in my family.

THE CONQUEST OF SPEECH:

Consider the plight of poor Walter
Ernsting, earnest German sci-fi fan.
A one hundred Deutschmark fine
(about $25 in our money) was
levied against him for defending
George Pal's "Conquest of Space"
against derogatory criticism in one
of the leading German newspapers.
Ernsting, who is editor of the Ger-
man s.f. fortnightly, Utopia, was
thrilled by the picture, which he
saw twice at once, but incensed by
a review which he considered ignor-
ant, ill-informed, unfair, usw.
(that's German for etc). So he
wrote a protest to the paper — and
was promptly taken to court for it!
Sued and made to pay for "insult-
ing the editor".

It was only last year that we "fit
the battle" — the Battle of Bonn — to
save science fiction in Germany.
Most of you won't have been aware
that there was even any controversy
over there, but a branch of the Ba-
varian Government lit a Bonn-fire
under science fiction that threat-
ened for awhile to incinerate the
whole subject. The same ardent de-
fender of s.f., Walter Ernsting,
made a day's journey, at his own
expense, to the seat of Government
to represent and defend the maga-
zine he edits, Utopia, from charges
of "atom mongering", glorifying
nuclear warfare and other thoughts
farthest from the peace-loving
mind of long-standing scientific-
tionist Ernsting who had dreamed
of introducing modern science fic-
tion to his countrymen even while

a prisoner of the Russians. An ap-
peal to America for moral support
was answered by airgraphs and
cables of protest from the Los An-
geles Science Fantasy Society, the
international Fantasy Foundation,
the League for Better Science Fic-
tion (New York), and concerned
individuals throughout the country.
A 2000 word "Open Letter" was
composed, translated into German,
professionally printed and distrib-
uted prior to the hearing to the
District Attorney and the panel of
twelve (lawyer, educator, minister,
psychologist, author, businessman,
etc) who investigated the case. In
answer to the charge that some of
the stories were "too realistic and
horrible in their description? of
weapons of the future", I con-
tended :

There are many great writers ex-
pressing great philosophies, bom-
barding the human brain with
thoughts and ideals, ways and
means of achieving the Utopian civ-
ilization for which all sane men
yearn. If sometimes they dip their
pens in acid and blood and paint
pain-pictures of ghastly atomic hor-
ror, it is to crystalize for their per-
haps less imaginative brethren the
disastrous results of unholy ambi-
tion, twisted reasoning, misapplied
science. For every bomb that drops
in science fiction, an explosion takes
place in the mind of the reader that
blows away misconception. For
every tower of lies ihat is toppled,
a skyscraper of truth is erected. Bet-
ter bitten by a snake on paper than
in reality! And if we are shown the
snake on paper, we learn to recog-
nize and avoid it in reality.

If 8 of the 12 individuals judg-
ing the merits of science fiction and
the issues of the magazine in ques-
tion had turned thumbs down, it
would virtually have been the end
of the modern s.f. experiment in
Germany. Which would have been
not only tragic but downright ridic-
ulous, considering what Germany
has contributed to the genre via
Willy Ley, Fritz Lang, Curt Siod-
mak. Otto Willi Gail, Thea von
Harbou, Heinz Haber, Rick Strauss
and Frank R. Paul. (Incidentally,
to Frank Rudolph Paul, my favorite
illustrator and the grand old dean
of stf artists, my love, respects and
congratulations to you, sir, on turn-
ing 70. May your enchanted brush
be with us yet when you are 100.)

But science fiction got a clean
slate at L' Affaire Bonn: the Bonn-
shell exploded, and out of the
smoke and flame came a 100% ex-
oneration for science fiction.

The Science Fiction Club
Deutschland has been formed, has
over 150 corresponding members, a
lending library, and a society organ,
ANDROmeda.

WHEN 1 WAS enroute to the 13th
World S.F. Convention I stopped
off in Chicago and visited the of-
fices of Playboy, the sophisticated
men's magazine that features a lot
of slick sci-fi, and made the ac-
quaintance of the editor, Ray Rus-
sell. He turned out to be a dyed-
in-the-Wells fan from 'way back
when Ray Bradbury was in romp-
ers, and spent an afternoon remi-
niscing with me about the Good
Old Days of Eando (Earl and
(Continued on page 112)

W-'

Illustrated by Paul Orban

HUMAN

BY RAYMOND F. JONES

The government was spending a billion dollars to convince

the human race that men ought to be ashamed to be

men — instead of errorless, cybernetics machines. But they

forgot that an errorless manris a dead man . . .

DURING ITS three years' exist-
ence, the first Wheel was prob-
ably the subject of more amateur
astronomical observations than any
other single object in the heavens.
Over three hundred reports came
in when a call was issued for wit-
nesses to the accident that destroyed
the space station.

It was fortunately on the night
side of Earth at the time, and in a
position of bright illumination by
the sun. Two of the observers had
movie cameras attached to their

ten-inch mirrors. The film in one of
these was inadequate, but the other
carried a complete record of the in-
cident from the moment of the
Griseda's first approach, through
the pilot's fumbling attempt to cor-
rect course, and the final collision.
The scene was lost for a few sec-
onds as the wreckage drifted out of
the field. The observer had been
watching through a small pilot
scope, however, and had wits
enough to pan by hand so that he
got most of the remaining fall that

ERROR

was visible above his horizon as the
locked remnants of the Wheel and
the Griseda began their slow, spiral
course to Earth.

By the time this scene was fin-
ished, word of the disaster was al-
ready flashing to Government cen-
ters. Joe McCauley, radio operator
aboard the Wheel, had been talk-
ing with Ed Harris on the Griseda.
As a matter of routine, all their con-
versation was taped, and some of
this was recovered from the crash
and played back at the investiga-
tion.

" — and get this," Ed was saying,
"my kid had his fifth birthday just
last week, and I've got him work-
ing through quadratic equations al-
ready. You've got to go some to
beat that one."

"Doesn't mean a thing," said Joe.
"You know how these infant brain
boxes burn out. Better take him
fishing and forget that stuff for a
while. Hey — what the devil's going
on? You got a truck driver in the
control room? I just saw you out
the port and it looks like you're
right on top of us!"

"Jeez, I dunno. It's been like that
ever since we cleared Lunaport.
Sometimes I think this guy Cum-
mins trained in a truck the way he
— Hell, he's comin' up on the wrong
side of the Wheel! I relayed the or-
ders to go to the east turret. Ac-
knowledged them himself — "

"Ed! I can see you outside the
port — we're going to hit!"

The words were ripped by the
shattering, grinding roar of collid-
ing metal. Then a moment later the
blast of an exploding fuel tank.

"Ed!"

"Joe— yeah, I'm here. Lights
gone. Emergency power still on.
Take the emergency band if you've
still got a rig. I'll stand by — "

Joe switched over without com-
ment and called Space Command
Base on the emergency channel,
which was always monitored.
"Wheel just rammed by Griseda"
he said. "Possible loss of orbital ve-
locity. Extent of damage unknown."

Lieutenant James, on duty at the
Base, had just returned from a
three day leave and was scaircely
settled in the routine of his post
once more. He glanced automati-
cally at the radar tracking screen
and his face paled at the sight of
the irregular figure there, slightly
out of the centering circle. It was
no gag.

"You're dropping," he said. "Or-
bital velocity must be down. Can
you correct?"

"I haven't been able to contact
the bridge," said Joe. "Alert all
Command and have crash point
computed. Stand by."

It developed that the bridge was
entirely gone, along with a full thir-
ty percent of the station. Captain
West had been spared, however, be-
ing on inspection in the other sec-
tor of the station. He came on at
once as Joe McCauley managed to
get the communication lines re-
patched.

"Emergency red!" he called. "All
stations report!"

One by one, the surviving crew
chiefs reported conditions in their
sectors. And when they were fin-
ished, they all knew their chance of
survival was microscopic. Captain
West ordered : "Communicate with

RAYMOND F. JONES

Base. Request plotting of crash
point."

"Done, sir," Joe answered.

"Command post will be establish-
ed in the radio room. Emergency
steering procedure will be started
on command. Man all taxi craft."

It was all on the tapes that were
salvaged. Everything was done that
desperate men could humanly do.

At Base, its Commander, General
Oglethorpe, was in the communica-
tions and tracking room by the time
Joe McCauley had established con-
tact with Captain West.

He picked up the mike at the
table. "Plug me in to the station,"
he commanded the Lieutenant.

He got Joe first, but the radio
operator put Captain West on as
soon as he arrived in the radio
room. "Hello, Frank," said General
Oglethorpe in a quiet voice.

"Yes, Jack — " Captain West an-
swered. "I'm glad you're there.
Does it look pretty bad?"

"Orbital velocity is down two
percent. You've been falling for
eight minutes."

"That's pretty bad. I've got all
steering stations manned, but only
thirty percent of them are still oper-
able. We're using the taxis to give
a push too. But we haven't been
able to dislodge the Griseda. Its
inertia takes almost half our avail-
able energy."

"Couldn't you get a blast from
the Griseda's tubes to put you in or-
bit?"

"Adier's got a crew out there
working on it. But his controls are
gone, besides his fuel tanks being
opened. And even if we could get

HUMAN ERROR

their rockets operating it's doubtful
we could get the right direction of
thrust. Our hope is in our own
rockets, and in breaking the ship
away from the station."

But the closer the massed wreck-
age dropped toward Earth, the
higher were its requirements for or-
bital velocity. While the crews
worked at their desperate tasks
General Oglethorpe sat with his
eyes on the tracking scope, and the
voice of his friend in his ear. He
listened to Captain West's measured
commands to the men in the station
and to those working to free the
ship. General Oglethorpe heard the
repeated reports of failure to free
the Griseda. He listened to West's
orders to transfer fuel from the ship
to the station as the latter's supply
ran low. He watched the continued
deviation of the spot on the track-
ing scope.

Then he turned as a lieutenant
came up behind him with a sheet of
calculations. "Present rate of fall
indicates a crash point in the San
Francisco Bay region, sir."

The General gripped the paper,
his face tightening. West said, "Did
I hear correctly. Jack? The San
Francisco area?"

"Yes."

"We'll have to try to keep it from
happening there. I'll order the
rockets shut off now. We'll save
enough fuel to try to do some last
minute steering as we approach
Earth."

"No!" General Oglethorpe cried.
"Use it now! Its effect will be the
same as later. Blow the chambers
apart! Get back in orbit!"

"We can't make it/' West said

quietly. "We've gained forward ve-
locity, but I'll bet your computers
will show us better than four per-
cent below requirements at this or-
bit. Spot our crash as accurately as
possible on free fall from our pre-
sent position. We'll save remaining
fuel for last minute steering in case
we're near a city."

The General was silent then as he
heard the responses come back
from the men who manned the
rockets and who knew that with the
closing of their fuel valves their
own lives had also come to an end.

"We'll want testimony account
for the investigation," Oglethorpe
said finally. "Get the responsible
officers on the circuit — but you first,
Frank—"

There was a moment of silence
before Captain Frank West began
speaking in changed tones. "What
is there to say?" he asked, finally.
"You won't need to hold an inves-
tigation. I can tell you all you need
to know — all you'll ever find out at
least, — right now. Your decision
will be the same one so many hun-
dreds and thousands of investigat-
ing boards have made in the past:
Pilot Error.

"Human error! That's what
killed the first Wheel, and the Gri-
seda. I don't know why it hap-
pened. Adler doesn't. Neither does
any other man up here with us.
Those who were with Cummins in
the control room are dead, but they
didn't know any more than we do.

"We spent a million dollars train-
ing that man, Cummins. We be-
lieved he was the best we could pro-
duce. We measured his reflexes and
his intelligence and his blood com-

position until we thought we knew
the function and capability of every
molecule in his body. And then, in
just one split second, he makes the
decision of a moron, fumbling when
he needed to be precise."

"Just what did he do?" Ogle-
thorpe asked gently.

"Our customary approach is to
the west turret. This time he had
been ordered to go to the east side
because of repairs on the other end
of the hub. Cummins had seen and
acknowledged the orders. Ap-
parently, they slipped his mind dur-
ing approach to the Wheel and he
came up on the west side. Then he
remembered and tried to correct his
position.

"Everything must have gone
wrong then. The decision was a
blunder to begin with. Wrong ap-
proach, yes. But it was suicide to at-
tempt such a detailed maneuver
that close to the station. He used his
side jets and slammed the Griseda
into the Wheel at a forty-five degree
angle, locking the ship in the wreck-
age of the rim and in the girders of
the spokes."

"Was there any previous indica-
tion of instability in the pilot that
you know of? We'll get a better an-
swer on that from Adler, but we
need to know if you were aware of
anything."

"The answer is no! Cummins was
checked out before the start of the
flight just three days ago. He was all
right as far as any of our means of
evaluation go. As right as any man
will ever be —

"Jack, listen to me. Remember
when we were back at White Sands
and talked of the days when there

RAYMOND F. JONES

would be a Wheel up here, and
ships taking off for the Moon and
for Mars?"

"I remember," said General
Oglethorpe softly.

"Well, we've got a piece of that
dream. But there'll never be any
more, and what we've got is going
to go smash unless we correct the
one weakness we've never tackled
properly. You'll fail again and
again as long as men like Cummins
can destroy twenty years' work and
billions of dollars worth of engineer-
ing construction. One man's stupid,
moronic error, and all of this goes
to destruction, just as if it had
never been.

"On the ground, a plane crashes
— the board puts it down as pilot
error and planes go on flying. You
can't do that out here! The cost is
too great. It's a sheer gamble put-
ting this mountain of machinery
and effort into the hands of men
we can never be sure of. You think
you know them; you do everything
possible to find out about them.
But you just don't know.

"We've solved every other tech-
nical problem that has stood in our
way. Why haven't we solved this
one? We've learned how to make a
machine that will perform in a pre-
dictable manner, and when it fails
to do so we can provide adequate
feed-back alarms and correctors,
and we can find the cause of error.

"With a man, we can do nothing.
We have to accept him, in the final
analysis, on little more than faith.

"A couple of hundred men are
going to die because of a human er-
ror. Give us a monument! Find out
why men make errors. Produce a

HUMAN ERROR

means of keeping them from it. Do
that, and our deaths will be a small
price to pay!"

These were the words of a dead
man. They were heard again and
again in the committee rodms and
investigation chambers. Tney were
printed and broadcast around the
world, and they enabled General
Oglethorpe to do the thing that be-
came a burning crusade with him.

He would probably have failed in
his effort if those words hadn't been
spoken by a dying man while a
shrieking, white-hot mass plunged
through the atmosphere to land, fi-
nally, in the waters of the Pacific.

The wreckage missed the city of
San Francisco without the necessity
of guidance by the rocket fuel so
preciously hoarded by West. The
Wheel and the Griseda were
doomed the moment the pilot,
Cummins, decided to shift the posi-
tion of the ship with respect to the
station.

IN THE anteroom of the Base
Commander's office, Dr. Paul
Medick rubbed the palms of his
hands against his trouser legs when
the secretary wasn't watching, and
licked the dryness that burned the
membrane of his lips.

The secretary remembered him.
She probably had been the one to
make out his severance papers and
knew all about Oglethorpe's firing
him.

Now she was no doubt wondering
about the General's calling him
back after that bitter occasion —
just as Paul himself was wondering.

But he was pretty sure he knew.
If he were right it was the oppor-
tunity of a lifetime, and he couldn't
afford to muff it.

The girl turned at the sound of
a buzz on the intercom. She smiled
and said, "You may go in now."

"Thanks." He stood up and told
his nerves to quit remembering the
last time he passed through the
door he was now entering. General
Oglethorpe was nobody but the
Base Commander, and if Paul Me-
dick got thrown out once more he
would be no worse off than he now
was.

Oglethorpe looked up, a grim
trace of a smile at the corners of his
mouth. He shook hands and indi-
cated a chair by the desk, resuming
his own seat behind it. "You know
why I called you — in spite of our
past differences."

Paul hesitated. He didn't want
to show his anxiety — and hopeful-
ness — He weighed the answers that
might be expected of him, and said,
"It's this crash thing — and the ap-
peal of Captain West?"

"Would there be anything else?"

"I'm flattered that you thought
of me."

"There's nothing personal in-
volved, believe me! I'd a thousand
times rather have called somebody
else — anybody else — but there's no-
body that can do the job you can."

"Thanks."

"Don't bother thanking me. I ex-
pect there'll still be a great deal of
difference between us about the
basic goals of this project. But once
we start I don't want to have to
fire you again."

"Just what is the natxure of this

project," said Paul, "its goals? Fill
me in on the details."

"There are no details — beyond
what you've read and heard —
you're going to provide them. The
objective is to find a kind of man
that will keep the Frank Wests of
the future from dying, as those men
aboard the Wheel did."

"What kind of man do you ex-
pect that to be?" Paul asked.

"One who will eliminate, for all
time, the damning verdict that has
been handed down in tens of thou-
sands of investigations of accident
and disaster: human error.

"We're going to find a kind of
man who can be depended on to
function without error. One who
can undertake a complicated task of
known procedure and perform it an
infinite number of times, if neces-
sary, without a single deviation
from standard."

Paul Medick regarded the Gen-
eral through narrowed eyes. In spite
of his almost agonizing desire to
possess the appointment to head up
this Project he had to have a clear
understanding with Oglethorpe
now. He had to risk his chances, if
necessary, to make himself absolute-
ly clear.

He said, "For untold thousands
of years the human race has spent
its best efforts to reach the goaf of
perfection without achieving it.
Now you propose to assemble all the
money in the world, and all the
brains and say: give us a perfect
man! The United States Space
Command demands him!"

"Exactly." General Oglethorpe's
face hardened as he returned Paul's
steady gaze. "No other technical

RAYMOND F. JONES

profilem has been able to stand be-
fore such an attack. There is no
reason why this one should. And
the problem must be solved, or
we're going to have to abandon
space just as we stand on the fron-
tier, getting our first real glimpse of
it."

"Your world is such a simple, un-
complicated place. General," said
Paul slowly. "You want a man with
two heads, four arms, and a tail?
Order it! Coming up!

"That's the way you operated
when I set up your basic personnel
program five years ago. It didn't
work then; it won't work now."

The General's face darkened. "It
will work. Because it has to. Men
are going to the stars — because they
have to. And they're going to
change themselves to whatever
form or shape or ability is required
by that goal. They've done every-
thing else they've ever set them-
selves to do — life came up out of
the sea because it had courage. Men
left their caves and struck out across
the plains and seas, and took up the
whole Earth and made it what it is
— because they had courage.

"But to go to space, courage is
not enough. We need a new kind of
man that we've never seen before.
He's a man of iron, who's forgotten
he was ever flesh and blood. He's a
machine, who can perform over
and over the same kind of compli-
cated procedure and never make an
error. He's more reliable and en-
durable than the best machines
we've ever made.

"I don't know where we'll find
him, but he can be found, and you
will do it, because you believe^ as I

HUMAN ERROR

do, that Man's frontier must not
be closed. And because, in spite of
your cynicism, you still understand
the meaning of duty to your society
and your race. There is no possibil-
ity of your refusal, so I have taken
steps already to make your appoint-
ment official."

"You must also have prepared
yourself," said Paul, "to accept me
with the basic philosophy that must
guide me in this matter. And my
philosophy is that this Project must
fail. It has no possibility of success.
The man you seek does not exist.
An errorless man would be a dead
man.

"Any living man is going to make
errors. That's the process of learn-
ing : make an approach, correct for
error, approach again, correct once
more. It's the only way there is to
learn."

The General inhaled deeply and
hesitated. "I know nothing about
that," he said finally. "You know
what I want. Even if what you say
were partially true, there remains
no reason why that which has been
learned cannot be performed with-
out error. I may have to put up
with it, but you'll save yourself and
all of us a lot of time if you don't
spend three months digging up rea-
sons why the Project can't succeed."

He stood up as if everything had
been said that could possibly be
said. "Let's go and have a look at
your laboratory quarters."

In the hot sunlight of the South-
west desert, they walked across the
yard from the administration build-
ing to a large laboratory which had
been cleared to the bare floor and

11

walls. Paul felt a sense of instability
returning. But only for an instant.
He'd all but insulted the General
and told him he had no intention
of producing the iron superman the
Space Command contemplated.
And still he had not been thrown
out. They must want him very bad-
ly, indeed!

He had no qualms of conscience
about taking the post now. General
Oglethorpe had been forewarned
and knew what Paul Medick's
hopes and intentions were.

"You can build your staff as big
as you need it," the General was
saying. "This Project has crash
priority over everything else. We've
got the machines to go to space.
The machines need the men.

"You can have anybody you
want and do anything you like to
them. We hope you can put them
back together again in reasonable
shape, but that doesn't matter too
much."

Paul turned about the bare room
that would serve adequately as of-
fice space. "All right," he said.
"Consider Project Superman be-
gun. Remember, I have no hope of
finding a solution in an errorless
human being. I'll find whatever an-
swer there is to be found. If you
have any objections to my working
of those terms, say so now. I don't
intend to get fired again with a
Project in the middle of its course."

"You won't be. You'll find the
way to give us what we need. I
want you to come down to the other
end of the building and meet a man
who will be working closely with
you."

There had been sounds of activi-

12

ty in the distance, and General
Oglethorpe led Paul towards them.
They entered a large area in which
instrumental equipment was being
set up. A tall, thin, dark-haired
man came up as they entered.

"Dr. Nat Holt," said the General,
"instrument and electronics expert.
This is Dr. Medick, the country's
foremost man in psychology and
psychometric analysis.

"Dr. Holt will be your instru-
ment man. He will design and build
whatever special equipment your
researches call for. Let me know
soon what you'll need in the way of
furniture and assistants."

He left them standing in the
nearly bare room. Through the
window they watched his stiff form
march back to his own office.

Nat Holt shifted position and
grinned at Paul. "I may as well tell
you that the General has briefed me
thoroughly on what he considered
your probable reaction to the Proj-
ect. I'm just curious enough to
want to know if he was right."

"The General and I understand
each other-— I think," said Paul.
"He knows I'm contemptuous of
his approach to a problem of hu-
man behavior by ordering it solved.
But he knows I'll take his money
and spend it on the biggest, deepest
investigation of human behavior via
psychometrical analysis that has
ever been conducted."

"It ought to be enough to buy
gold fringed couches for all the an-
alysts in the country."

Paul raised his brows. "If it's
that way with you, then why are
you joining me?" he asked.

"Because I have a stake in this,

RAYMOND F. JONES

too! I want to see the problem
solved just as much as the General
does. And I think it can be solved.
But not this way !

"There's only one way to prod-
uce men of superior abilities. The
method of adequate training. Hard,
brutal discipline and training of
oneself. I'm going to convince Ogle-
thorpe of it after he's seen the fail-
ure you intend to produce for him."

"That shouldn't be hard," said
Paul. "It's the General's own view.
The Project is simply to implement
that view.

"But let's not have any misunder-
standing about my intentions. I ex-
pect to give honest value in research
for every dollar spent. I expect to
turn up data that will go a long
way toward providing better space-
men for the Command — and to
give Captain West the monument
he asked for!"

Alone in his hotel room that
night, Paul stood at the window
overlooking the desert. Beyond the
distant hills a faint glow in the sky
marked the location of Space Com-
mand Base. He regarded it, and
considered the enormity of the
thing that was being brewed for the
world in that isolated outpost. Now
the chance was his to prove that
manhood was a quality to be proud
of, that machines could be built
and junked and built again, but
that a man's life was unique in the
universe and could never be re-
placed once it was crushed.

For years he'd struggled to probe
the basic nature of Man and find
out what divorces him from the
merely mechanical. He'd known

HUAAAN ERROR

there would probably never be
enough money to reach his goal.
And then Oglethorpe had come, of-
fering him all the money in the
world to reach a nebulous objective
that Space Command did not know
was unobtainable.

Somebody was going to spend
that money. With clear conscience,
Paul rationalized that it might as
well be him. He'd see that the coun-
try got value for what it spent, even
if this was not quite what the Space
Command expected.

Nat Holt was going to be a most
difficult obstacle. Paul wished the
General had let him pick his own
technical director, but obviously the
two men understood each other. In
their separate fields, they were alike
in their approach to human per-
formance. Whip a man into line,
make him come to heel like a re-
luctant hound. Beat him, shape
him, twist him to the form you
want him to bear.

Discipline him. That was the
magic word, the answer to all
things.

Paul turned from the window in
revulsion, drawing the curtains on
the skyglow of the Base.

Human error!

When would Man cease to in-
dulge in this most monumental of
all errors? When would he cease to
regard himself and his fellows as
brute creatures to be beaten into
line?

He had to find the right answer
before Oglethorpe and his kind
found some flimsy validation for the
one they had already chosen long
ago.

He stood up and glanced at the

13

clock, deciding he wanted dinner,
after all. Tomorrow he'd wire Betty
and the kids to get packed and be
on their way. No — he'd phone to-
night. She had a right to know im-
mediately the outcome of his inter-
view.

The dining room was almost
empty. He ordered absently and
clipped the speaker of his small per-
sonal radio behind his ear while
waiting. He seldom used it, but here
in the desert was a sense of isolation
that made him seize almost com-
pulsively upon any contact with the
bright, distant world. The music
was dull, and the news uninspiring.
He was about to turn it off when
his order arrived.

The wine was very bad ; the steak,
however, was good, so Paul consid-
ered it about even. His finger
touched the radio switch once
more. The newscaster's voice
changed its tone of pounding ur-
gency. "Repercussions of the recent
crash of the world's first space sta-
tion are still being heard," he said.
Murmurs of protest against con-
struction of a new Wheel are rising
in many quarters. Today they ap-
proach the proportions of a roar.

The influential New England
Times states that it is 'unqualifiedly
opposed' to any restoration of the
Wheel. 'In its three years' existence
the structure proved beyond any
question of doubt its utter lack of
utility. Now its fall to Earth demon-
strates the menace constituted by
its presence over every city on the
face of the globe.'

"Senator Elbert echoes these sen-
timents. 'It was utter folly in the
first place to spend billions of dol-

14

lars to construct this Sword of
Damocles in the sky of all the world.
I propose that our Government go
on record denying any further in-
tention to rebuild such a threat to
the peace and well-being of nations
who stand now on the threshold of
understanding and friendliness
which they have sought for so
long.' "

Paul switched it off. He remem-
bered the hours of worldwide ten-
sion while the Wheel was falling
toward the city of San Francisco. In
panic, the whole population of the
Bay Area attempted evacuation,
but there wasn't time. The bridges
became clogged with traffic, and
some hysterical drivers left their
cars and jumped to the waters be-
low.

As the wreckage neared Earth,
the computers narrowed their circle
of error until it was certain at last
that the city would not be struck.
But the damage was done. The fear
remained, and now was congealing
in angry determination that another
Wheel would not be built.

Paul finished his meal, wonder-
ing what effect this would have on
the plans to build a new Wheel —
and on Project Superman. Maybe
Congress would react in anger that
would cut off all appropriations to
the Project.

He wondered, in sudden weari-
ness, if this would not be an un-
mixed blessing, after all.

THE NEXT three days were
spent in telephone and tele-
graph communication with mem-
bers of his profession as he proceed-

RAYMOND F. JONES

ed to recruit a staff.

On Friday, Betty arrived with
the kids. By the end of the follow-
ing week, laboratory furniture had
been installed and the first trickle
of potential staff members was com-
ing in to see what Superman was
all about. Nat, too, had been busy
forming his own staff and setting
up basic equipment.

Paul had the feeling that they
were opposing camps setting up on
the same site of exploration. He
tried to tell himself it was complete-
ly irrational, until Nat approached
him a few days later.

"Quite a crew you're getting in
here," the technician said. "You'll
have to take Oglethorpe up on his
offer of new buildings if you expect
to find couch space for all your
boys."

"That's what you're here for,"
Paul suggested mildly, "to do away
with couches."

"Right." Nat nodded. "Anything
a couch can do, a meter can do
twice as efficiently."

"Sometimes both are necessary.
You forget my specialty is psycho-
metry."

"No, I'm not forgetting," said
Nat. "But that's what makes it so
hard for me to figure out. You're
attempting to span two completely
incompatible fields: science and
humanities. Man behaves either as
a machine or as a creature of un-
stable emotion. To function as one
you have to suppress the other."

"Splitting Man in two has never
produced an answer to anything.
It has been tried even longer than
couches— and with far less result."

"I'll make you a small side bet.

HUAAAN ERROR

We going to have to work together
on Superman, and coordinate all
our procedures and results. But I'll
bet the final answer turns up on the
side of a completely mechanistic
man, shorn of all other responses
and motivations."

"I'll take that!" Paul said with
a grim smile. "I don't know how
much of an answer we'll find, but I
know that won't be it!''

"Let's say a small celebration
feed for the whole crew when Su-
perman is completed. Nothing
chintzy, either!"

They shook on it. And afterward
Paul was glad the incident had oc-
curred. It left no doubt about the
direction Nat Holt would be trav-
eling in his work.

Four weeks to the day, from the
time Paul had stepped into Ogle-
thorpe's office, he called the first
meeting of his staff leaders. Invita-
tions to the General and to Nat
Holt were deliberately omitted. He
wanted this first get together to be
a family affair.

He felt just a little shaky in the
knees as he got up before that
group for the first time.

"I won't repeat what you already
know," Paul said carefully. "You
all know the background events
that produced Project Superman.

"I am sure that each of you has
also caught the two basic errors
that have been assumed by the
Space Command, first, that an er-
rorless man is possible, and second,
that genuine scientific discovery can
be secured wholly upon command.
General Oglethorpe recognizes that
we consider these assumptions er-

15

roneous, but he also knows that our
professional integrity demands that
we pursue vigorously a course
which he believes will result in suc-
cess.

"We recognize, too, that we are
not here to invent or produce any-
thing that does not already exist.
But, in a sense, our superiors and
some of our co-workers expect us
to do exactly that.

"We can agree, however, that
most of Man's potential still re-
mains to be discovered. And for us,
who have hoped for a means of
understanding that potential, this
Project is the fulfillment of dreams.
If we fail to take full advantage of
it, we will win the condemnation of
our profession for a century to
come.

"Space Command has already
concluded that a man can be
stripped of his humanity and driven
to an utterly mechanistic state with
the robotic responses of a machine.
Let there be no mistake about it:
we have been brought here to vali-
date that conclusion.

"We will validate it by default,
so to speak, unless we can produce
a clean-cut analysis and demon-
strations of the thing that most of
us believe: that the essence of Man
is more than a piece of machinery
or a collection of bio-chemical re-
actions.

"Our science of mind and Man
is on trial. If we fail, we give con-
sent to a doctrine that will spread
from space technology to all the
rest of our society, and bind Man
in an iron mold that will not be
broken for generations. While we
have been hired and will ostensibly

16

work at the task of developing an
errorless man, our basic purpose
must be to validate the humanity
of Man!"

He waited for their reaction.
Outside, far across the open desert
at the station, a rocket screamed in-
to the air. They waited until the
sound died away.

Professor Barker stood up. "There
is scarcely a human being who has
not by now read or heard the words
of Captain West's appeal. They
will be looking for the day when
there will come marching from our
laboratories, like a robot, the error-
less man he asked for.

"Do you mean we have to fight
the stated objectives of this Proj-
ect? Can we not discover sufficient
understanding to establish some
method of training which will ac-
complish, in another way, the
things the Space Command needs?"

"We are not fighting the Space
Command's desire for more ade-
quate men for its ships," said Paul.
"We are fighting only against the
false conclusions they have already
formed concerning the nature of
such men.

"We must solve the problem of
human error. We know its purpose
in the learning process. We must
discover the reason for its exist-
ence in a learned process. We have
to find out what training actually
means.

"We have to ask how we know
when an error has been made. It is
obvious, of course, when a space-
ship rams a fixed orbit station. But
what of the subtler situations,
where results are less dramadc, or
are postponed for a long time — ?

RAYMOND F. JONES

"The primary thing to remember
at this point is that our basic goal
is to prevent any false confirmation
of the dogma that Man is no more
than a badly functioning machine,
which will gain value when he has
been tinkered with sufficiently so
that he can slip in beside the gears
and vacuum tubes and be indistin-
guishable from them. And to reach
this goal we must discover his true
nature."

It was two weeks later that Gen-
eral Oglethorpe made his first
visit since Superman got under way.
The soldier's face seemed more
deeply lined and his eyes more
tired than Paul remembered seeing
them before.

"You seem to have things well in
hand," he said. "How soon can you
give us some tangible results?"

"Results! We've just started
housekeeping. In a year, maybe
two, we'll have an idea where to be-
gin a concentrated search for what
you want to know."

The General shook his head
slowly, his eyes remaining on Paul's
face. "You aren't going to have
anything like a year. You haven't
got time to run down one line of
research and then another. Run
them all at once — a thousand of
them if you want to. Why do you
think you've got the budget you
have!"

"Some things," said Paul, "like
threading a needle — or analysing
a human being — don't go much
faster when a thousand men work
at it than when there's only one."

"They do when there're a thou-
sand needles to thread — or brains

HUMAN ERROR

to pick. And that's what we're up
against here. We need a volume of
the kind of men we've been talking
about, and we need them quick!"

"We have to find out how to get
the first one."

"And you haven't got as much
time now as we thought you had
when Superman began. They're
trying to close us up.

"We hadn't planned to build
another Wheel right away, not un-
til some refinements of design had
been worked out, and we had some
results from Superman.

"Now, all that's been scrapped.
We've received orders from Wash-
ington that erection of a second
Wheel is to begin at once, using
the plans of the first one. Fabrica-
tion of structures is already under
way."

"I don't understand," said Paul.

"If we don't get another one up
there within a matter of weeks, this
hysterical opposition among the
public is liable to prevent us ever
getting one there again. We have to
act while we still have authority,
before the crackpots persuade Con-
gress to take it away. And by the
time it's built, I want some men to
put in it. Men who can be trusted
to not jeopardize it the moment
they put their clumsy feet aboard. I
want them, Medick, and I intend
to have them. That's by way of an
order!"

The General rose, but Paul re-
mained seated. "You can't get them
that way, and you know it," the
latter said. "We'll do all we can, as
I've told you before."

"I think you'll do considerably
more, now. That was quite a talk

17

you delivered to your boys a couple
of weeks ago. We will 'ostensibly
work at the task of developing an
errorless man', is the the way I be-
lieve you put it. You're going to do
a lot more than ostensibly work at
it, Medick. Just how much do you
think you can get away with?"

Paul remained motionless in the
chair. Only his lips moved. "So you
had a report on our little meeting?
I hope it was complete enough to
give you the rest of the things I
said, that my basic purpose was not
to produce human robots, but to
validate the humanity of man."

Oglethorpe leaned closer, his fists
resting on the top of the desk. "The
humanity of man be damned! I
told you before we want men
who've forgotten they were ever
human, men of metal and elec-
trons. If I didn't think you were
the man who could do it — probably
the only man in the whole country
— you wouldn't last here another
minute. But you can do it, and
you're going to.

"Your little lecture was enough
to ruin your career in any place you
try to run to, if you undermine Su-
perman. Who do you suppose
would trust you with any kind of
research after that expression of in-
tent to sabotage the Project your
Government entrusted you with,
and which you agreed to carry out?

"You're finished, Medick, washed
up completely in your own profes-
sion, unless you give me what I've
asked for! I won't take promises
any more. The only assurance you
can give me from here on out is re-
sults ! I want those men, and I want
them damn fast!"

18

PROFESSOR BARKER lis-
tened attentively as Paul sat
across from him in the administra-
tion office and reported Ogle-
thorpe's visit and demands.

"We're caught in a squeeze, and
we've got to push both ways," Paul
said. "If the Base goes down, Su-
perman goes with it, and we've lost
an opportunity that will never come
again in our lifetimes. So we've got
to do two things: We've got to
give active support to the rebuild-
ing of the Wheel, and we've got to
develop some kind of show that
will convince Oglethorpe that Su-
perman is giving him what he
wants. It will mean detouring our
basic objectives, but it's necessary
in order to have a project at all. I'd
like you to take charge of it."

"It'll be a waste of time," Barker
said slowly. "I wonder if we'll ever
get back on the track."

"We'll have to gamble on it,"
said Paul. "I don't want you to feel
I'm deliberately pushing you up a
blind alley, but I think you're the
best man for bringing up something
we can sell Oglethorpe — while we
try to do some real research on
some honest goals."

"We can follow the usual lines
of so-called training — brute con-
ditioning through shock and fear
and pain and discomfort. Most of
the men here are already well an-
aesthetized in that respect. Their
breakdown level is high."

"Cummins' was the highest,"
said Paul, "and he cracked. But
work along those lines anyway.
Maybe we can find a way to thick-
en the conditioning armor. At the
same time let's push a genuine in-

RAYMOND F. JONES

vestigation into the nature of error
as hard as we can. For the moment
we'll forget broader objectives, un-
til we know the Project is safe."

Barker agreed reluctantly, feel-
ing that they would end up as mere
personnel counselors before long.
As soon as he left, Paul called Ogle-
thorpe.

"I've got a suggestion," he said.
"Let's not get on the defensive
about this thing. Why don't you
propose a Senatorial investigation
of Space Command?"

"Are you crazy? Why would we
want to have them come out here
and pick our bones to pieces before
making final burial?"

"We've got a story to tell them
— remember? We've got Superman,
that's going to produce for the first
time in the world's history a man
adequate to go into the dangers of
space. And there's that little story
of yours about courage. I think
that would go over with them.
We'd be out in front if we took the
initiative in this instead of just
waiting until it rolled over us."

There was a long pause before
Oglethorpe spoke again. "I wonder
just what you're trying to do," he
said finally. "I know you don't
mean a word of what you're saying
at all—"

"But I do mean it," Paul said
earnestly. "I want Superman saved ;
you want the Wheel. It amounts
to the same thing."

"You could be right. You might
even be telling the truth. I'll give
it some thought."

The officer in charge of the rock-
et crews and the take-off stand

was a young engineer-soldier named
Harper. Paul had met him during
the first week at Base. His endorse-
ment of Project Superman was en-
thusiastic.

After talking with Oglethorpe,
Paul took a jeep over to the stand
and located Harper. The engineer
was overseeing the fueling process
on a big rocket.

"Doc Medick!" Harper ex-
claimed. "How's your crew of head
shrinkers coming along? We're
just about ready for your new
breed of pilots."

"What do you mean?"

"This is the nucleus ship. She's
going out in orbit tonight with the
first batch of supplies and instru-
ments to get ready for the new
Wheel. We're going to need your
men awfully fast."

"That's what I came to talk
about. Can you spare a few min-
utes?"

"Sure." Harper led him to the
office, where the whining of fuel-
ing pumps was silenced. "What
can we do for you?"

"I wanted to ask about Cum-
mins. You knew him pretty well,
didn't you?"

"Buddies. Just like that." Harper
crossed his fingers.

"What went wrong, do you
think? I know it's all been hashed
over in the investigations, but I'd
like your personal feelings about
him."

Harper's face sobered and he
looked away a moment. "Cummins
was as good a guy as they come,"
he said. "But in a pinch he was
just a weak sister. That doesn't
mean he didn't have a lot on the

HUMAN ERROR

19

ball," Harper added defensively.
"He was a better pilot than most of
us ever will be, but he was just hu-
man like the rest of us."

"What do you mean, 'human'?"

"Weak, soft, failure when the
going gets rough — everything we
have to be on guard against every
minute we're alive."

"I take it you don't think much
of human beings, as such."

Harper leaned forward earnestly.
"Listen, Doc, when you've been
around ships as long as I have,
you'll know what Captain West
really meant. The weakest link in
any technological development has
always been the men involved with
its operation. In space flight our
weakness is pilots and technicians.
Set a machine on course and it'll
go until it breaks down— and flash
you a warning before it fails. With
a man, you never know when he's
going to fail, and you have to be on
guard against his breakdown every
minute because he won't give any
Warning.

"Think what it's like to be in our
shoes! We take the controls of a
few hundred million dollars worth
of machinery, and we know that
every last man of us is booby-
trapped with some weakness that
can break out in a critical moment
and destroy everything. We fight
against it; we struggle to hold it in
and act like responsible instru-
ments. And we grow to hate our-
selves because of the weak things
that we are.

"Cummins was like that. He
fought himself every waking hour,
knowing that he had a weakness of
becoming confused in a tight spot.

20

Oh, it was nothing that even
showed up on the tests, and he was
the best man of any of us on the
Base. But he knew it was there, just
as we all know our closets bulge
with skeletons that we try to keep
from breaking out."

"Do you fight yourself the way
Cummins did?" Paul asked.

"Sure."

"What would happen if you
pulled a blunder that wrecked that
ship out there on the stand."

"I'd have had it, that's all. I'd
never get within ten miles of a rock-
et base again as long as I lived.
And there wouldn't be much worth
living for — "

"It would be pretty wonderful to
feel you weren't constantly on the
verge of some disastrous blunder,
wouldn't it?"

"It would be a rocket man's idea
of heaven to handle these ships
with that kind of a feeling inside
him."

"We're about ready to begin run-
ning tests on Superman, and I'd
like you to be the first to help us
out. Can you arrange it?"

"We're tied up like a ball of
string on getting the nucleus ship in
orbit. I know Oglethorpe gave or-
ders we were to jump when you
called, but I'll have to check on
replacements for those of us you
take. What kind of test are you
going to run on me?"

"I want to find out how long it
takes you to make a serious error,
and what happens to you when you
do!"

Arrangements were made for in-
itiating this series of tests two days

RAYMOND F. JONES

later. Paul had designed them, and
Nat Holt's crew had built the
equipment.

But before they were started,
Paul grew increasingly aware of the
clamor and public agitation against
the Wheel. Instead of dying out
after a small spurt of anger, it was
accumulating momentum in every
corner of the nation.

A rabble rouser named Morgan
in the middle-west had proposed a
motor caravan to Space Command
Base, where the participants would
go on a sit-down strike until as-
surance was given that no Wheel
would be built again. And on the
heels of this came the demand by
an increasing number of Senators
for a full investigation of the Base.

Paul met Barker after seeing the
newscast of Morgan's revivalist
type appeal for a caravan of prO'
test against the Base. "This looks
like it could get to be something
that would be hard to handle,"
Barker said. "It doesn't seem rea-
sonable that the near-crash of the
first Wheel at San Francisco could
be responsible for all this commo-
tion."

"I don't think it is," Paul an-
swered reflectively. "The sinking of
a big ocean liner doesn't produce
hysterical demands that no more
ships be built. The crash of an air-
ship with a hundred people aboard
is accepted for what it is, without
this kind of reaction. I think these
broadcasts and write-ups of Gap-
tain West's appeal have sunk in
deeper than Oglethorpe or anyone
else ever intended.

"For a long time there has been
building up a sense of man's in-

HUMAN ERROR

feriority to his machines. Now this
incident of the Wheel and the
world-wide broadcast of West's
final words have triggered that in-
feriority into a genuine fear.
They're afraid to have another
Wheel up there over their heads.
They're afraid that no man is capa-
ble of mastering such a piece of
machinery."

Not only the public was infected
with this fear, but the very men on
whom the operation of the ships
depended. Harper was right, Paul
thought, as he reached his own of-
fice again. It must be terrible to be
in their shoes, fighting constantly
the conviction that they were poor
miserable creatures hardly fit to
polish the shining hulls of their
creations!

They were trained in the best of
military traditions, crushing their
weaknesses by sheer force. And they
had concluded their own break-
down was inevitable, in spite of
their training and traditions. How
could such men even hope for the
stars!

But where was the flaw in it all?
If the answer was not in men who
were more nearly like their own
machines, where was it?

They needed a year or two to
even approach the problem proper-
ly, and some kind of answer was
demanded within weeks!

Oglethorpe came to the labora-
tory the morning Harper was to be-
gin his test runs. "We're going on
a complete crash-priority basis,
with round-the-clock shifts," he
said. "It's been a toss-up whether
to close Superman and put every-
thing we had on the new Wheel, or

21

leave it open in the hope of getting
something out of it.

"For the time being I'm leaving
it open, but remember that every
hour Harper or one of his men
spends here is an hour away from
the job on the Wheel.

"We didn't need your suggestion
about an investigation. Plenty of
other people thought of it first. The
Senators will be here in four or
five days. You're going to talk to
them. You're going to tell them
what you proposed to tell them,"

"Of course. And what are you
going to do about Morgan's caval-
cade?"

Oglethorpe spat out an exclama-
tion. "We'll set up barricades that
they'd better not cross within ten
miles of Base!"

"That won't help," Paul warned.
"I think you'd better let me pre-
pare something for them, too."

"Forget them! Take care of the
Senators and the Project and you'll
be doing enough."

Harper arrived shortly, nervous
in spite of his attempt to appear
composed. But he was put at ease
when they took him to the labora-
tory of complex testing equipment
assembled by Nat Holt.

Paul indicated a seat in the mid-
dle of the mass of equipment. "As
near as we've been able to make it,"
he said, "this simulates the landing
procedure of a rocket craft. There
are a hundred and thirty-five dis-
tinct actions, observations and
judgements involved. A taped
voice will lead you through the se-
quence, asking you to press buttons
and make adjustments to indicate
your observations and responses.

22

When you can do all this to your
satisfaction, you will turn off the
tape and continue for as many
cycles as you can."

"How long? A man could do that
for a month, provided he didn't
have to sleep."

"I think you'll be a little sur-
prised. You will continue until
your accumulation of errors be-
comes so great that the entire pro-
cedure collapses."

"It still looks like a kid's game to
me," Harper said confidently.
"Let's get started."

Carefully, they fitted the mul-
tiple electrodes of the electro-en-
cephalograph recorder to his. skull.
The tape instructor was turned on,
and Harper began the first cycle.

Behind the one-way glass of the
observation room, Paul sat with
Nat Holt and Professor Barker and
two assistants, watching. The rocket
engineer began jatmtily, contemp-
tuous of the simple actions re-
quired of him, impatient to have it
over with and get back to his duties
at the take-off stand.

The instructions coming over the
speaker had some variations from
the normal handling of a ship, in-
cluding the items necessary to re-
cord observations and responses.
Harper listened to these for a half
dozen cycles. Then, confident that
he could breeze through the pro-
cedure for the rest of the day if he
had to, he switched off the tape
and settled back to take it easy.

One by one, he watched the
meters, noted their information,
made the proper adjustments, add-
ed compensations, waited for re-
sults, checked and re-checked —

RAYMOND F. JONES

"He'll go a long time," said Nat
Holt confidently. "He's had top
training. If it breaks down, we may
find out a few things."

"Cummins had top-drawer train-
ing, too," Paul said. "His break
point seemed to have no adequate
antecedents. I don't think we're
going to find Harper holding out
very long."

After an hour, the attitude of
contempt had left Harper's face,
and he was proceeding with ob-
vious boredom. He had made no er-
ror yet, but there was evident a
faint trace of anxiety as he con-
centrated on the instruments and
levers.

At two hours and a half Harper
reached for a button and withdrew
his hand in abrupt hesitation. Then
it darted out again and pressed de-
cisively. At three hours he was mak-
ing two such hesitations every cy-
cle.

"Not so good," Barker comment-
ed. "Not for a man who battles
himself the way Harper does."

Nat Holt remained silent, watch-
ing critically the wavering dials
and graphs showing the engineer's
physical condition and reaction.

At four and a half hours. Har-
per's hand reached for a lever in
the center of the board. But it
didn't get more than a third of the
way. In mid-air it froze, as if paral-
ysis had suddenly struck it. Harper
regarded it in seeming dumb as-
tonishment. His face grew red, and
sweat broke out upon his forehead
as if from the physical exertion of
trying to put his hand to the lever.

Paul grabbed a microphone and
switched it on. "Touch the lever,"

HUMAN ERROR

he commanded, "Draw it toward
you."

Harper looked around as if in
panic, but he completed the mo-
tion. He sat staring at the panels
for a full two minutes while alarm
eyes went from green to yellow to
red.

"Alarm red!" Paul exclaimed in-
to the microphone. "Correct
course!"

Harper turned and glared about
with hate in his eyes as if to find
the source of the sound. He began
tearing at the wires and contacts
fastened to his head and body. "To
hell with the course!" he cried. "I'm
getting out of here!"

He hurled the wiring harness at
the panels. Then, he stood in a
moment's further paralysis and
slumped finally into the chair. He
put his arms and head down on the
instrument desk and began sob-
bing deeply.

Paul put away the microphone
and moved to the door. "That's the
end of that," he said. "I hope our
record is good. Harper might not
like to go through that again."

Nat Holt was still staring through
the window at the sobbing engineer.
"I don't understand," he mur-
mured. "What made him break
down like that for no reason at
all?"

ONE BY one, the top engineers
of the Base went through the
breakdown test. Some broke down
with an emotional storm as Harper
had, others simply ended in a swirl
of confusion that put lights flash-
ing all over the panels. But all of

23

them had a breaking point of some
kind that could be measured in a
small number of hours.

The test was a stab in the dark.
It was based on an old and well-
known principle that repeated tac-
tile contact under command will
break down the motor responses of
the body in a matter of hours. Paul
did not know whether it would ac-
tually provide a fertile lead to the
problem of error or not, but it
seemed the closest possible ap-
proach at present.

Nat Holt, however, was astonish-
ed at the reaction of the men. He
insisted on trying it himself, deter-
mined that he would not break
down no matter what happened.
He lasted six hours before the panel
lit up like a Christmas tree.

He subjected the resulting curves
to an analyzer, and to his own he
gave the most detailed attention.
At the end of a full week of study
on it, he called Paul with an ex-
citement he could not suppress in
his voice.

"It looks like you owe that din-
ner," he said. "We've got what we
were looking for!"

"What are you talking about?"
Paul demanded.

"We've got proof that a human
being is nothing more nor less than
a simple cybernetic gadget. It's a
laugh — people trying to build a
mechanical man all these years.
That's the only kind there is!"

"You still aren't making sense."

"Come on over and see for your-
self."

Puzzled and irritated, Paul left
his office and went down to the
analyzer laboratory. There he

24

found Holt and his staff in a buzz
of excitement.

Tlie multiple recorder sheets
were laid out on long tables, being
studied intensely. Paul followed
Holt to one series that was sepa-
rated from the rest.

"We didn't know we had any-
thing at first," said Holt. "The
pulse was so low in amplitude that
it was hard to pick out of the noise,
but the analyzer showed it was con-
sistently present under certain con-
ditions of the subject."

"What conditions?" said Paul.

"At the exact moment of com-
mitting an error! I should say it oc-
curs between the moment of mak-
ing the decision to carry out an
erroneous act and the triggering of
the motor impulse that executes it."

Paul frowned. "How can you be
sure it doesn't occur at any other
time as well?"

"Because we've run every set of
charts through the analyzer and
this particular impulse comes out
no other place."

"It looks very interesting," Paul
said. "But why did you say you've
got proof that a human being is
nothing but a cybernetic gadget?
I don't see what this has got to do
with it."

"I didn't give you quite all the
story," Holt said smugly. "I should
have said that the pulse occurred
every time there was an intent to
perform an error. Sometimes that
intent was not carried out."

"I don't understand."

"That pulse is nothing more nor
less than a feedback pulse indicat-
ing that an action matrix has been
set up which is in non-conformity

RAYMOND F, JONES

with the previously chosen pattern
of learning or intent. It's a feed-
back alarm carrying the informa-
tion that an error will result if the
proposed action is carried out.
When the feedback is successful-
ly returned to the action matrix a
change is made until there is no
feedback and a correct action is
taken. When the feedback is
blocked or ignored, an error results.
It's as simple as that! Your com-
plex human being is nothing but a
fairly elaborate cybernetic machine
operating wholly on feedback prin-
ciples. The only time he fails and
breaks down is when he ceases to
act like the cybernetic machine
that he is!"

Holt's eyes shone triumphantly
as he patted the long strips of paper
on the table. Paul followed the mo-
tion of his hand and remained star-
ing at the graphs in a kind of
stunned recognition. There must be
some mistake, there had to be.
Holt's interpretation was wrong,
even if the data were correct. Man,
a feedback response mechanism — !
If that were true a vacuum tube
structure could eventually be de-
vised to do anything a man could
do.

"I think we'll hold off on that
dinner a while yet," Paul said.
"The data are interesting and, I'm
sure, important — but I can hardly
agree with your conclusions." In-
wardly, he cursed the stiltedness
he felt creeping into his voice, and
his irrational resentment of Holt's
continued smug grin.

"Take all the time you want,"
Holt said, "but when you're

HU^y^AN ERROR

through you'll come up with the
same answers I've got. Man is a
machine and nothing else. Our
only job now is to discover why the
feedback sometimes fails, and to
set it back on the job."

Paul took the recording? and the
analyzer graphs back to his own
office.

He called Barker and showed the
older man what Holt had found
out. "If this is true," he said, "we
don't need to worry about validat-
ing Space Command's pre-chosen
conclusions. It has already been
done."

Dr. Barker looked puzzled and
a little frightened as he sat down at
the desk to examine the charts.
After an hour, he looked up. "It's
true," he said. "There's no escaping
the fact. Look what we have here
— " He pointed to a corresponding
sector of the six charts he'd lined
up.

"After the first feedback impulse,
there was no attempt to correct,"
he said, "or, rather, there was a
deliberate effort to suppress the
feedback. This created a second,
larger feedback, which, in turn re-
sulted in increased suppression and
a simultaneous enlargement of the
error. The result was a hunting
effect in increasingly large ampli-
tude, like the needle of an autosyn
indicator with undamped positive
feedback.

"Now, here's another one with
the opposite effect. In this case the
hunting shows diminishing ampli-
tude as correction of the effort re-
sults from application of the feed-
back pulses. One pulse is not suffi-
cient, but they are applied in de-

25

creasing force as the intent is
brought into alignment with the
learned pattern. A purely mechan-
ical response!"

Paul turned from the window
through which he had been staring
toward the launchers. "Then Space
Command is perfectly right," he
said bitterly. "We can give them
their errorless, mechanical men —
just as soon as we find ways of cor-
recting the blockage of the feed-
back pulses!"

Barker leaned back in his chair
and folded his hands across his
moderate paunch. "I'm afraid
that's right. We've been wrong all
along in bucking the mechanical
concept of Man. The technologists
saw it long ago in a sort of intui-
tive way, but they couldn't prove
it. Now, they can!"

"And the soul of Man is nothing
but a feedback impulse!"

Barker sighed heavily. "What
else, Paul?"

Morgan's Caravan appeared
that evening and camped at the
ten-mile limit imposed by the mili-
tary police guards. They posted
their signs of protest and began
their picket lines. Oglethorpe sent
out his sound trucks to try to scare
them away, but they wouldn't
scare.

Paul watched at home the broad-
cast of the scene, but the fate of the
Base and the Wheel had almost
ceased to concern him. He told
Betty of the discovery Holt had
made on Superman.

"It leaves nothing to account for
the most valued acts of Man," he
said. "It can't account for crea-

26

tiveness, because a cybernetic de-
vice cannot create; it can only fol-
low a pattern. So where is the
poetry, the art, the scientific in-
vention if this is the essence of
Man? It can't be, yet there's no
way of getting around this thing."

"Where does the pattern come
from?" asked Betty. "Isn't that the
created thing which the cybernetic
system tries to follow?"

Paul shook his head. "The pat-
tern we're talking about is no more
than a response to stimuli, a purely
mechanical thing also. Holt claims
this is all there ever is, that what
we call art, poetry, music inspira-
tion, and intuition are nothing
more than the results of badly func-
tioning cybernetic systems. The
more or less irrational results of
errors in accommodating to the
real world. We find pleasure in
them because they tend to excuse
our badly malfunctioning circuits.

"The ideal, race of Man would
be devoid of all this, a smoothly
operating group of individuals un-
perturbed by emotional or artistic
responses, completely capable of
solving any problem in a purely
cybernetic manner."

"And do you agree with it?" Bet-
ty asked.

"There's nothing else I can do!
The evidence is there." He laughed
shortly and moved to the window
where he could see the nearby
camp of Morgan's Caravan. "Hu-
man development has moved— is
moving — in a completely different
direction from anything I ever
dreamed. Oglethorpe's iron-hard,
emotionless machine-men are the
only ones who'll get there. The rest

RAYMOND F. JONES

of us who can't match the pace of a
technological society will be
shucked ofiF as the waste part in the
development of a species meant to
inhabit galaxies instead of a single
world."

"If I had ever wondered how
you'd sound when you were com-
pletely out of your mind I'd have
the answer now," said Betty.

In the morning he turned over to
one of the units the task of further
identifying and analyzing the feed-
back impulse they had discovered.
In the middle of this he was called
to Oglethorpe's office. The investi-
gating Senators had arrived.

They were favorably impressed
by the day-long tour that General
Oglethorpe provided for them
around the entire Base. But they
found in Paul's announcement the
strongest single factor in favor of
permitting Space Command to con-
tinue with its work.

"We know now," he said, "and
this is something I haven't even
had time to present to General
Oglethorpe — we know that a com-
pletely mechanical man is possible."

The General's eyes narrowed as
Paul's flat statement continued.
"We know that it is possible to
have men at the helm of our ships,
who are incapable of error. We
have hopes of producing them with-
in a very short time if Project Su-
perman is allowed to continue. And
when this is done, there is no tech-
nical goal we cannot reach."

This was the thing the Senators
had come to find out, and they
were satisfied. "But the public has
got to be reassured of this," Sena-
tor Hart said. "We need to get

HUMAN ERROR

this mob away from your gates for
one thing. The news programs
keep them constantly before the
public eye and the whole country
is stirred up."

"We'll take care of it at once,"
General Oglethorpe said. "As Dr.
Medick has indicated, this dis-
covery is so new that even I had
not been informed of it. Morgan's
mob will go away as soon as they
hear the news. And that, in turn,
will reassure the entire country. We
can arrange for a broadcast by Dr.
Medick to the whole nation."

Paul was swept along as arrange-
ments were made to make a state-
ment to Morgan and his group
camped outside the Base, to the
press, and to the public in general.

Oglethorpe cornered him after
the meeting with the Committee.
"This is on the level," he said, "not
something you cooked up on the
spur of the moment?"

"It's on the level," said Paul.
"You were right all along."

When he returned to his office
an urgent message from Barker
awaited him. He hurried down to
the testing laboratory, where the
older man greeted him in excite-
ment and anxiety.

"It looks like we've got some-
thing by the tail and can't let go
of it. Come in and have a look."

Paul followed him and found
Captain Harper in an observation
room, writhing on a cot in a storm
of tears and emotional fury. He
beat against the walls and the
floor with his fists as his sobbing
continued beyond control.

"What happened to him?" Paul
demanded.

27

"We have three others in the
same condition," said Barker. "We
tried to determine the effect of a
pure feedback impulse, and fed it
back to each of them in amplified
form as we found it on their charts.
This is what happened. I'm afraid
we may have cost them their sanity,
and we don't know why."

"How could their own feedback
do such a thing to them?" he asked
in wonder. "What part of the chart
did you take it from?"

"We used the impulse that didn't
get through, the one that was
blocked so that error resulted. Ap-
parently this is the alternative to
error." He nodded toward the
writhing, sobbing man. "Harper
reached a point where he had to
fail or else be subject to this psy-
chic storm."

Paul ran his long, bony fingers
through his hjiir. "This makes less
sense than ever! If that's true, then
we've got to take back what we've
told Oglethorpe. His errorless man
isn't possible, after all."

"I don't know." Barker shook his
head thoughtfully. "Evidently the
production of error is a protection
against the admission of this in-
tolerable feedback impulse. But the
question remains: why is it in-
tolerable, and why does it become
so after numerous other feedback
impulses have been passed?

"Yesterday we thought we had
it all wrapped up. Now it's blown
open wider than ever before!"

Oglethorpe's public relations
man prepared a statement to the
effect that further danger from
pilot error in rocket ships and the

28

second Wheel could be considered
as completely eliminated with the
new training processes that would
make men incapable of technical
errors.

Paul knew it was as ineffectual
as the average Government release,
but he made no protest in his con-
cern for Harper and the three
other men. He signed the statement
automatically.

He was presented the following
day, however, with arrangements to
give it personally to the members
of Morgan's Caravan from the top
of one of the soimd trucks. He did
protest then that any flunky on the
Base could read it to the crowd as
well as he. But Oglethorpe insisted
he do it personally.

With official pompousness the
big, olive-green truck rolled out
from the Base. Paul rode beside the
driver and Metcalf, the public re-
lations man. He'd not told Ogle-
thorpe about their latest develop-
ment. If this psychic reaction to
feedback proved an impenetrable
barrier there' d be time enough to
give Space Command the bad
news. In the meantime a Wheel
would be buUt, the public would be
mollified, and Superman would
continue on — to what unknown
ends Paul didn't know.

The massed camp of the fanatic
followers of Morgan appeared in
the distance like a discarded rag on
either side of the road. Then as
they approached it broke into in-
dividual knots of sand-scoured, un-
washed people clustered about their
tents. Morgan hadn't given much
thought to adequate facilities be-
fore leading them out here.

RAYMOND F. JONES

The truck rolled to a halt in the
center of the camp. Morgan him-
self, a long, lanky figure in a dusty
black suit, came at the head of a
group of his people to meet them.
"I hope you have the news we are
waiting for," he said cordially.

"We have a statement," said
Metcalf. "Dr. Medick here, who
has made an important discovery
that will enable all of you to return
to your homes, will read it to you."

Paul could have stayed in the
cab, but he preferred to climb to
the platform atop the truck to get
a look at the crowd Morgan had
assembled. He hesitated a moment
with the paper in his hands, then
took up the mike and read the
statement Metcalf had prepared.
"The United States Space Com-
mand wishes to announce that — "

It fell utterly flat on completely
non-understanding ears. Paul
looked over the mass of faces and
knew it had failed. Something far
more than this was needed. A little
feedback, he thought grimly. A lit-
tle feedback of the idiocy of their
present situation to correct their
course and return it to normalcy.

"Five hundred years ago there
might have been a crowd of people
just like you," he said suddenly in
low tones. "There was a harbor,
and some small ships, and a man
who believed he could sail them
over the edge of the world. On the
shore were people who thought he
was a fool and a blasphemer, and
a few who thought he was right —
or at least hoped he was.

"Five hundred years ago was
the beginning of a new freedom
from the prison of a tiny, con-

HUMAN ERROR

stricted world. Today, another free-
dom waits our successful conquest
of space. And whenever a freedom
has been won there have been more
who jeered against it than have
cheered for it. You are today mak-
ing a choice — "

He talked for ten minutes, and
when he was through he knew that
he'd accomplished his goal. Even
before the sound truck pulled out,
the cars of the Caravan were break-
ing away from the mass and dis-
appearing in the distance.

"Nice job," Metcalf congratulat-
ed, as if he'd been responsible for
it himself.

"Just a little feedback in the
right place — " murmured Paul ab-
sently.

"Feedback? What's that — new
kind of propaganda technique — ?"

"Yeah, you might call it that.
How could a guy have been so
blind — ?" he said fiercely, more to
himself than to his companions.

He hurried to the laboratory as
soon as the truck got him back to
Base. He rounded up Barker and
Nat Holt and a dozen of his other
top men. "The answer's been under
our noses all the time," he said.
"We've been too busy fighting each
other for the sake of our own pre-
conceived notions to have seen it!"

"What are you talking about?"
Holt demanded.

"Feedback. Can't you guess what
it is?"

"No."

"Are you willing to let us give
you a small dose — something less
than the level given Harper and
his men — and then tell us what you
find out about it?"

29

Nat Holt looked hesitant. "If you
think you know what you're talking
about. There's no point in my get-
ting in a condition like Harper's."

"We'll pull you out before you
get anywhere near that far."

Still dubious, he took a seat amid
the mass of pulse generating equip-
ment and electroencephalograph
recorders. A single pair of feed-
back terminals were fitted to his
skull. The generator was set to
duplicate his own feedback impulse
taken from a moment of failure.

Paul switched on the circuits and
advanced the controls carefully. A
look of pain and regret crossed
Holt's face. He cried out with a
whimper. "Turn it off!"

"A second more — ," Paul said.
He advanced the control a hair
and waited. The technologist be-
gan to cry suddenly in a low, sob-
bing voice.

Paul cut the switch.

For a moment Holt continued
to slump in the chair, his shoulders
jerking. Then he looked up, half-
bewildered, half-furious. "What
did you do to me?" he demanded.

"You did it to yourself," Paul re-
minded him. "That's your own
feedback pulse just beefed up a lit-
tle, remember. How did it feel?"

"Terrible! No wonder a guy
dodges that. It's enough to make
him wreck a space station to avoid
the full blast of it."

"What would you call it?"

"I don't know—," Holt hesitated.
"Grief, maybe. Regret — anxiety.
But regret, mostly, I guess."

"That's your feedback," Paul
said as he removed the terminals
and turned to the others. "These

feedback pulses we've isolated are
nothing but stabs of pure emotion."

He turned with a faint smile to
Holt. "You and Harper and the
rest of the iron-bowelled boys were
so convinced that the pure mechan-
ical man would be utterly devoid
of all emotional responses and con-
tent! And I was so sure that a
warm, responsive, emotional human
being could never respond like a
cold machine!

"And we were both utterly
wrong. The human being does both.
He operates on true cybernetic
principles. But the content of his
feedback control pulses is sheer
emotion !

"A small error, a stab of regret.
It's repeated, magnified, or dimin-
ished until the action gets back on
the track that brings predicted re-
sults. Ignored, the error builds up
until the whole structure goes
smash.

"And we're taught to ignore it!
It's the noble, brave and manly
thing to ignore the human feelings
that surge through us. Be steel, be
glass, be electrons — anything but a
responsive, emotional human being!
That's the way to be a super-man!
We've tried to find the way to per-
fection and have fought tooth and
nail against the only means of
achieving it."

Barker's face was glowing with
excitement and Holt seemed to be
remembering something afar off.
"That was it," he breathed softly.
"I can feel it now — the way it was
as I began to get jittery and make
mistakes in the test procedures. I
seemed to fight something within
myself — something I thought was

RAYMOND F. JONES

making me do it wrong. But it
wasn't that, at all. I was fighting
against the emotional feedback the
errors were throwing at me."

"Right," said Paul. "And your
iron-hard, errorless Superman is
going to be the most emotionally
sensitive creature you can produce."

"How did you catch on to this?"
Barker asked.

"We should have seen it in Har-
per. He's the original iron-man.
He's bottled up and fought his
emotions all his life. A concentrat-
ed dose of his own feedback simply
shattered the dam.

"But I didn't get it until I
watched Morgan's mob reacting to
the purely rational explanation
Metcalf prepared to convince them
they should go home. They were on
a wrong tack and needed a gen-
erous amount of the right feedback
to get them back where they be-
longed. The cold, logical approach
was a dud. What does it take to
move an intractible mob? Emotion
— based on the projected con-
sequences of what they're doing. A
perfect feedback setup when cor-
rectly applied. And it worked."

Holt shuddered faintly and
moved away from the chair he had
sat in to experience his own feed-
back. "I'm not quite sure who owes

who that dinner," he said to Paul.
"But I think somebody does."

"We'll split it," Paul said. And
then he was silent as they listened
to the departure of another cargo
ship carrying parts of the second
Wheel to the thousand-mile orbit.

He smiled to himself. Ye of little
faith! — he thought. Frightened
about the true nature of a race that
had come through three billion
years of the kind of torment that
Man had survived!

Man had everything that was
needed to go to the stars or any-
where else he might want to go. He
was safe. Man could never be
turned into a robot. The basic
mechanisms of his humanity were
so interwoven with the structure of
his being that they could never be
separated.

But they hadn't come very far,
Paul knew. They had opened only
a small crack in a door that had
been irrationally closed from the
beginning of time. They had to
know fully why that door had never
been opened before. And beyond it
might lie a thousand others just as
tightly closed and closely guarded.

Yet they had reached a starting
point, at last. Project Superman
could get about its business of pre-
paring men for the stars. • • •

A free sample copy of the current issue of

FANTASY TIMES

the science fiction newspaper will be sent to any reader of
IF on request. Please mention this ad. FANDOM HOUSE,
P.O. Box 2331, Peterson 23, N.J.

HUMAN ERROR

31

THE

i^x^tntxnntx

t rit rtt

:5- fh- b, t=3=-

o o o o <:> a _y p o o o

Illustrated by Kelly Preas

The vote was three to two for death! Jacques had
no choice. He was a public servant with a duty . , .

BY FRANK RILEY

ba. ta^ tsy fe- te^ [Sb-

ii ■ • ■ I^ONTINUED FAIR weather and the unusual
V-< circumstances of the execution promise a turn-
away crowd of more than 100,000 spectators by Court time.
All unreserved tent space has been sold out for several days.
Next news at . . ."

Sir Jacques de Carougne, Lord High Executioner for the
Seventh Judicial District, spun the dial on the instrument
panel of his single-seater rocket, but the vidcasts were over
for another hour. He cursed, without too much vigor, and

wished he had troubled to look
at a vidcast or faxpaper during
his vacation. But then he
-shrugged his massive shoulders.
What did it matter? After a
thousand executions, everything
was instinct and reflex. Some
died hard ; some died easy. Some
fell to their knees, too paralyzed
with fear to fire their own shots.
Others fought daringly, even
with a degree of skill, but always
the end was the same : A broken
body bleeding and twitching in
the du.st; the blood-happy spec-
tators shrieking in the ecstacy
of release from the humdrum of
their pushbutton lives; the flow-
ers, the scented kerchiefs and the
shreds of torn garments show-
ered on him by screaming wom-
en, who always seemed to find
him more satisfactory in the
arena than in his tent.

As the skyline of New Chicago
shimmered into view, Jacques flipped on the 'copter mech-
anism. His air speed braked, and the needle-nosed little
craft drifted lazily down the eastern shore of Lake Michi-
gan, then veered westward over the tinted glass rooftops
of the spotless city.

Jacques stared glumly down at the city that had been so
much a part of his life, from the long-ago years of his train-
ing and youth to the professional years of his most famous
executions.

Farther to the west, out beyond the eternally green land-
scaping and the precise, functional homes of the residential

33

suburbs, Jacques saw the crude
stone parapets of the Chauvency
judicial arena, surrounded by acre
after acre of colorful tents and
pavilions.

His powerful, jutting nose wrin-
kled with disgust, but his eyes
widened at the number of tents.
There must indeed be something
unusual about today's execution.
He hadn't worked before that big
a crowd for years. The Federal
Bureau of Internal Tranquility
should be happy about this one!

Jacques sighed, still struggling
against the despondency that had
been within him since the vacation
interlude with the brunette govern-
ment worker in Curagao had ended
as unsatisfactorily as all the rest.
Someday it would be his body
bleeding in the dust, smashed at last
by the soft-nosed bullets from Le
Pistolet du Mort. Then the flowers
and adulation would go to the con-
demned man, and the Bureau
would add his name to the plaque
at the base of the towering statue
on the Washington Mall. So be it.
He had played a long roll of the
dice, and the stakes had been high.
But if only once, just once before it
ended . . .

The bell on his instrument panel
told him that the servo-pilot in the
tower below had taken over for the
landing. He sniffed with disgust
again, but this time the disgust was
for himself. God, but he was in a
foul humor today! He released the
controls and stared at his strong
hands, grimly admiring them.
There was still speed as well as
strength in these fingers. His lips
twisted into a thin smile, cold and

34

confident. Whoever he was to meet
at joute a I'outrance, let him try to
match twenty years of training and
skill!

His rocket cradled with scarcely
a jar into the small landing space
at the north end of the arena, be-
tween the two replicas of 15th
century towers, reproduced so faith-
fully by 22nd century technicians.
Jacques squeezed his huge frame
through the door of the small craft
and looked dourly around. A squire,
in scarlet leggings and tunic, his
long black wig slightly askew, came
running toward him and knelt three
paces away, as prescribed by the^
Judicial Code of Heraldry.

"Oh, sire!" he panted, "Thanks
be that ye have arrived! The hour
is well past noonday, and we had
begun to fear . . ."

"Time enough," Jacques
growled. He gestured impatiendy,
and the squire clambered to his
feet, bowing again.

"This way, your Lordship!"

The squire led him to the lower
room in the north tower. It was the
usual room of monastic simplicity
— whitewashed stone walls, a single
window, two wooden benches and a
low couch on which his garments
for the occasion had been careful-
ly arrayed. After the execution, he
would be moved to his black silk
tent in the center of the camping
grounds.

While the squire fluttered around
him, eager to be of help, Jacques
removed his short-sleeved dacron
shirt, kicked off his sandals and
stepped out of the comfortable
shorts he always wore for traveling.
The squire gaped with awe at the

FRANK RILEY

sight of his muscular body.

"M'Lord, truly thou art a power-
ful man!"

Jacques looked down at him with
mixed contempt and amusement.
The squire was a thin, pale little
man, with the pinched look of
nearsightedness about his eyes. His
wig and tunic were much too big
for him.

"What do you do. Squire?" Jac-
ques inquired, not unkindly.

The man looked hurt, as if the
question reflected somehow on his
ability to serve as a squire to the
Lord High Executioner.

"Computer development," he
muttered. "Resonating pentode cir-
cuits." Then he drew himself up
defensively, with not a little pride.
"But I placed at the top of the list
in the Bureau's test for squires!"

"That's fine," Jacques com-
mented drily. "Now hurry, let's see
what you learned ..."

"Dress him handsomely, Squire!"
boomed a taunting voice from the
doorway. "Our Lord High Execu-
tioner faces a rare challenge this
day!"

Jacques recognized the voice of
Guy de Archambault, the Court
BailiflF, whose bilious nose he in-
tended to grind into the dust one of
these fine days. But his anger at the
Bailiff's intrusion was overbalanced
by curiosity.

"What's all the excitement
about?" he demanded. "Who's on
the docket, anyway?"

The Bailiff grinned mockingly.

"Forsooth, M'Lord, restrain thy
impatience! In the Court's good
time wilt ye learn . . ."

"Oh, knock off that drivel, will

TH£ EXECUTIONER

you! Court's not in session yet . . ."

The Bailiffs huge belly shook
with laughter.

"Have it your own way, Jacques,
m'boy! But in any vernacular the
meaning's the same — you're in for
quite a surprise, if rumor has it
right!"

"Out with it, then! I can see
you've been waiting to tell me."

The grin broadened on the Bail-
iff's puffy lips.

"You can bet your last sou on
that! It would have broken my
heart not to be the first to tell
you . . ."

Jacques took a threatening stej-
toward him.

"I'll break more than your heart
if you don't answer my question

"Patience, pa — Oh, all right!"
the Bailiff hastily interrupted him-
self as Jacques took another step
in his direction. "You've got a
woman to shoot down this time —
and that's just half the story!"

Jacques' craggy features hard-
ened into immobility.

"What's the rest of it, fool?"

"There's gossip going around
that she's a page out of your past
— maybe several pages, or even a
whole chapter!"

Jacques leaped the rest of the
distance to the door' and grabbed
the Bailiff by his lace collar, twist-
ing it until his round, fat cheeks
swelled and reddened.

"Who is it?"

"L-Lady Ann— of— Coberly!"

Jacques thumped his head
against the side of the doorway.

"I told you to knock off that
drivel."

35

"But— but that's all I know —
I swear it! I just got here this
morning, too, and took a quick
peek at the calendar when I heard
all the rumors out among the
tents . . .!"

Jacques shoved him out into the
hallway, and stalked back into the
room. The Bailiff straightened his
collar, but made no move to leave.

"M'Lord," he jibed, breathing
heavily, "there's also a rumor that
you have no stomach for executing
any woman. Can that be true?"

Jacques only scowled in reply,
but he knew that this rumor, at
least, was true. The last woman
had been back in the Fifth Judicial
District. A flint-faced murderess
with the shoulders of a man. But
the horror of firing the coup du
mort into her naked, contorted
body still came back to haunt his
dreams. For weeks afterwards he
hadn't been able to touch the
women who came so eagerly to his
tent during the wild execution
night Festivals.

The BailifFs coarse voice con-
tinued to prod at him:

"I'm sure you'll remember this
one, once you see her! I've just
come from watching her being
dressed for Court!" The Bailiff's
bloodshot right eye winked sug-
gestively. "My duty, y'know, to
protect their Judicial Highnesses by
checking for concealed weapons."

"Get out of here!"

The Bailiff fell back a step, but
continued talking.

"I'd say she's your type all right
— full of fire! Too bad you have
to kill her instead of . . ."

Jacques ripped the white tunic

36

from his squire's trembling hands
and hurled it into the Bailiff's face.
Guy de Archambault waddled back
out of danger, then finding that he
was not followed, poked his head
around the edge of the door.

"Prithee, Sir Jacques, have ye
any message for their Judicial
Highnesses?"

"Yes, damn you! Tell them to
get someone else for this infernal
execution — and be quick about it!"

With a gleeful chuckle, the Bail-
iff disappeared again. The little
squire picked up the white tunic
and brushed it off dejectedly. If he
missed this opportunity to serve as
squire to the Lord High Execu-
tioner, his name would rotate to the
bottom of the list and he might not
have a chance to serve again before
it was time to make up new lists.

Jacques strode to the window.
Lady Ann of Coberly. The name
could mean anything or nothing,
according to the whimsy of the
lower courts. Lady Ann. . . Arm!
But it couldn't be her — Or could
it? Jacques looked far down the
years to a youngster just out of
training, eager to prove himself in
the execution arena. There had
been an Ann then, and she had left
one morning taking a young man's
heart with her, leaving behind only
the unfathomable look of reproach
and disappointment that he had
come since to know so well.

But it couldn't be that Ann! He
tried to create the image of her
face, but saw only the acres of
spectator tents, their bright pen-
nants snapping in the wind, and
the open squares teeming with
spectacular costumes copied from

FRANK RILEY

medieval history books by an atom-
ic age which found in the pageant-
ry of execution-day its one escape
from safe, sanitized, prescribed liv-
ing. The Arthurian song of a stroll-
ing minstrel drifted up to him. . .

"To the fairest of all maidens.

To Argante, the Queen, most
beauteous elf,

She will make my wounds all
sound.

And with a healing draught
make me full well. . ."

Jacques clenched his great fists.
No, he wouldn't do it. Seniority en-
titled him to some consideration. If
necessary, he'd put a call through
to the Bureau. They'd understand.
His record was good. He'd always
performed faithfully, meeting death
every session, dealing it out to
young and old alike.

But not to a woman; certainly
not to a woman who might have
meant a great deal to him! During
the long spartan years of his train-
ing, the isolated years of monastic
living at a time when youth burned
strongest in him, the image of wom-
an had become a haunting dream,
unreal as the moonlight streaming
through his curtainless window, un-
touchable as the mist of a summer
morning. A sense of that image and
unreality still persisted, even after
all the women who had come to
him so willingly and had left with
that undefinable look of unhap-
piness deep in their eyes.

Since that woman back in the
Fifth District, he'd been lucky with
his executions. Not too many wom-
en drew the death penalty, and the
few times women had been on his
docket he had learned of it suffi-

THE EXECUTIONER

ciently in advance to pretend illness
or make up some plausible excuse
for emergency leave. But today had
taken him totally by surprise.

The squire shuffled up behind
him, and begged,

"Please, your Lordship, shall we
not don these garments now?"

Jacques shook his head so im-
patiently that the squire scurried
back in fright.

And then the Bailiff's voice in-
toned sonorously from the door-
way:

"His Highness, Chief Justice of
the Seventh Judicial District!"

Jacques turned in time to see the
Bailiff bow low. The Chief Justice
entered with a swish of ceremonial
robes. He was followed by a tall,
thin man, dressed in knightly cos-
tume. The Bailiff made a second
bow, and spoke again:

"His Excellency, Sir Mallory,
representing the Federal Bureau of
Internal Tranquility!"

Jacques felt suddenly relieved. It
was good to have someone from
his own Bureau here. These judges
were too cold, too impersonal.

The Chief Justice was carrying
his wig, which was not yet fully
powdered. His heavy jowls quivered
with indignation.

"What's this nonsense. Sir Jac-
ques?" he demanded imperiously.
"Court is ready to convene — We
have no time to get another ex-
ecutioner!"

"I'm sorry, your Highness, but I
must ask your indulgence this one
time."

"Impossible!"

Sir Mallory stepped forward and
smiled in a conciliatory manner.

37

"Perhaps Sir Jacques does not
understand all the circumstances,"
he said soothingly. "You see, Sir
Jacques, this execution is very im-
portant to FBIT. There hasn't
been a first-rate execution in nearly
three years, and this is the only re-
lease we've had to offer the public
in all that time. Of course, the
Court still must decide in its own
wisdom whether there are any
grounds for setting aside the ver-
dict, but we would not want any of
our Bureau personnel to be re-
sponsible for disappointing the pub-
lic."

"I've always done my duty,"
Jacques protested. "But this one
time — "

"The FBIT is well aware of your
splendid record," Sir Mallory in-
terrupted, striking a hearty note of
sincerity. "Your services have been
deeply appreciated in these diffi-
cult times. Yet, we must always
take the long view! Particularly
'this one time', as you say. Tech-
nology has rushed us into a world
without need for strife or conflict,
but man has not yet matured
enough for such a world — and he
needs release to prevent dangerous
explosions. Believe me. Sir Jacques,
it would not be wise to postpone
today's execution!"

The Chief Justice cleared his
throat angrily.

"And it's not wise to stand here
talking while my court is waiting
to convene," he snapped "Sir Mal-
lory, can't you remind this man of
his oath, his duty, and be done
with it?"

Jacques felt his own anger rising.

"I know my oath," he growled,

38

"but—"

"Of course, of course, "mur-
mured Sir Mallory, "and the FBIT
shares your feelings. We also de-
plore — naturally — the idle gossip
that is circulating to build such in-
terest in this execution. But cir-
cumstances are beyond our control.
Sir Jacques. As public servants, we
must serve . . ."

The Chief Justice shook his wig
in Jacques' face.

"Your answer, man! "he de-
manded. "Are you or are you not
going to perform your duty?"

Sir Mallory stepped back, spread-
ing out his hands as if to show
Jacques there was nothing more he
could do about it.

Jacques stood tautly erect, im-
passive, while his mind reeled on a
hairline balance between defiance
and submission. He knew that more
than this one issue would be de-
cided by his next words. His entire
professional life was involved,
everything he had trained and
fought for since he had been select-
ed for the service at the age of
thirteen. A wrong word, and he
could be dismissed by the Bureau.
The rest of his years would be spent
in a cubicle in some atom-powered
plant, where he'd have his own
button to push for two hours every
day. The monotony would be in-
tolerable after the way he had
lived !

But to send his bullets smashing
into the body of a woman who
might be Ann . . . Sweat trickled
down the chiseled furrows of his
cheeks. Beside him, the little squire
was a study in still life, poised with
one foot forward, the white tunic

FRANK RILEY

still draped on his outstretched
arm.

"Sir Jacques, we are waiting for
your reply," prompted the cold
voice of the Chief Justice.

A turbulent voice within Jacques
urged him to turn his back on all
of them, but prudence counseled
that he play for time. From Sir
Mallory's oily manner, he could
very well have made up and cir-
culated the gossip about his sup-
posed past relationship with this
condemned woman. It might be
wise to wait a bit before making a
decision that could be so final.

Jacques bowed, and said hoarse-

"I await the orders of the Court,
Your Highness."

If the Chief Justice noted that
Jacques said "await" instead of the
more correct "will obey", he gave
no sign of it.

"Very well," he said. "Court
will convene in five minutes." He
turned so abruptly that he almost
bumped into the Bailiff, who was
making a poor effort to cover his
disappointment.

Sir Mallory smiled at Jacques,
and said warmly:

"The FBIT is proud of you!"

When they had left the room,
the still frightened squire stuttered :

"S-shall we d-dress. Sire?"

Jacques walked without answer-
ing to the couch and sat down on
the edge of it.

"Get a move on!" he ordered.
His feelings were in turmoil: He
was desperately eager to see this
Lady Ann, yet he dreaded the mo-
ment. If this was the Ann . . .

Fingers trembling, the squire

tHE EXECUTIONER

anointed each muscular shoulder
with three drops of perfumed oil,
after which he drew over Jacques'
head and upper body the white
tunic — white to symbolize the puri-
ty of motive in entering the ex-
ecution arena. Next came the black
breeches and hose — black for the
eternal remembrance of death.
Over the tunic came the flaming
red jupon, blazoned on the sleeves
with gules and on the back with a
lion rampant argent. On his left
shoulder, the squire fixed a lace of
white silk, representing a deed not
yet accomplished. Following the ex-
ecution, a woman who had won the
honor in her plant lottery would
cut it off.

After lacing on Jacques' boots,
the squire stepped back, snatching
an instant to admire his handiwork.

"Well done, Squire," said Jac-
ques. "Now, let's be off!"

The squire flushed and beamed
in gratitude. He picked up the sil-
ver case containing the two Pis-
tolet du Mort, one for Jacques, one
for the condemned person.

Court was on a portable plat-
form in the center of the Judicial
Arena. As soon as the execution
was confirmed, it would be wheeled
out of the way.

When Jacques stepped from the
tunnel and strode toward the plat-
form, an abrupt hush choked off
the babbling and laughter in the
stands. Most of the hundred thou-
sand capacity crowd was already
seated. Behind Jacques, the squire
straightened his narrow shoulders
with pride. This was the highpoint
in a life spent among the tapes,

39

circuits and feedback problems of
computer research.

Jacques mounted the platform,
bowed to the crowd and took his
seat in the black-draped, carved
oak chair to the left of the Bailiff.
His squire stood proudly behind
him. The Bailiff murmured :

"An imposing entrance for one
who had only five minutes to dress!
Your fair victim isn't here yet."

Jacques stonily ignored him.

An explosive cry from the stands
brought the Bailiff to his feet.

"Here she comes!" he announced
with a grin of anticipation. "Take
a good look. Sir Jacques — it's worth
while!"

Though it was the hardest thing
he had ever done, Jacques re-
frained from looking until the wom-
an and her two jailers had nearly
reached the platform steps.

And then he looked straight at
her, and the shock of it was a phys-
ical blow. This was Ann, all right.
Even after all the years there was
no doubt about it. She was as tall
as he remembered her, and there
was the same softness and warmth
in the curve of her sun-brown
shoulders. He suddenly felt the old
ache for her.

She held a velvet robe around
her shoulders, but she held it loose-
ly, disdainfully. Under it, she was
already dressed in the translucent
death gown. Her thick, blond hair,
much longer than the fashion of
the day, fell nearly to her shoulders.
On her feet were the silver sandals
she would later remove, along with
the velvet robe, just before step-
ping up on the pedestal in the ex-
ecution circle.

40

The two jailers, each in skull cap
and long black sleeveless robe, led
her to the prisoner's bench below
the dais where the judges would
sit. The sight of her was a torment
to Jacques, the ripping open of an
old scar. He knew that in a mo-
ment their eyes would meet, but
there was not enough strength in
the corded muscles of his neck to
turn his face away.

Time had been kind to her,
Jacques thought in one comer of
his numbed brain. There were
signs of its passing, around her
mouth and her eyes, but it had
given her what youth could not.
There was a knowing in the curve
of her lips, and he wondered what
her eyes would tell him now.

But she glanced first, with some
amusement, at the two jailers, who
held their crooked staffs at the alert
position. Next, her eyes contempt-
uously swept the semi-circle of emp-
ty judicial chairs. They passed by
the Bailiff so quickly that he looked
cheated, and then they stopped
full on Jacques.

He read in their calm appraisal
the knowledge that she had ex-
pected him to be here, and that she
was not surprised at what the years
had done to him. Perhaps she had
seen his pictures in the faxpapers,
or even watched some of his ex-
ecutions. But he wanted to know
more than this, and he tried to
look deeper into the light and
shadows of her eyes.

It was still there, he discovered,
feeling a selfish sense of pleasure
that she had not found what he
hadn't been able to give her. The
endless seeking, the search for some-

FRANK RILEY

thing never put into words, the
want unfulfilled — all this was still
there.

He knew that she was reading
him in the same way, but he could
not tell what she found. Finally, it
was she who looked away first, not
in retreat, rather to appraise him
thoughtfully. He felt her eyes on
the knotted muscles of his cheeks,
on his arms, on the whitened
knuckles of his scarred hands, on
his boots, now grey with dust from
the walk across the arena. When
her eyes came back to his, her un-
painted lips parted in a faint smile.

She knows, thought Jacques. She
knows I don't want to kill her! And
then the torment in him became
unbearable. What irony that out of
all the years of their lives they
should come back together at this
moment. An impulse tugged at him
to snatch his pistols from the
squire's silver box and try to take
her from the arena, daring any to
stop them.

Then he realized that the Bailiff
was standing again, that the hun-
dred thousand spectators were surg-
ing to their feet. Trumpet fanfare
blasted from the main tunnel, sig-
nalling the arrival of the judges.
Instinct brought Jacques to his
feet. Ann remained seated, and
rose only after the jailers nudged
her with their curved staffs.

"Oyez, oyez, oyez!" cried the
Bailiff into a microphone concealed
in a carved boar's head. " 'Tis now
two of the clock at aftir noone, and
yon heralds bearing trumpets of
devise give in knowledge unto all
gentilmen, ladyes and gentilwoom-
en the cooming of this high and

THE EXECUTIONER

most honourable court! Remain at
standing until said court is seated!"

The Chief Justice, regally stern,
led the procession of judges, clerks
and pages across the arena. They
mounted the platform, stepping in
cadence. When the robed and be-
wigged judges were all seated, the
Bailiff raised his staff and the crowd
settled down with a buzz of antic-
ipation. High atop one of the
north towers, hidden cameras
picked up the scene and vidcast it
around the earth, and to the satel-
lites and lonely planet outposts.

One of the clerks picked up five
rolls of parchment, untied the scar-
let ribbon on each, and passed
them around to the judges. The
Chief Justice went through the pre-
text of scanning his, then nodded
to the Bailiff to present the pris-
oner.

With a sly wink at Jacques, the
Bailiff took Ann firmly by the arm
and guided her three steps forward.
The Chief Justice coughed the
nervousness from his throat, and
asked :

"Is this the Lady Ann of Cober-
ly?"

Before the Bailiff could make the
correct response, Ann gave her own
impatient answer.

"I am Badge No. 7462883, Tran-
sistor Division, Coberly precision
Products, Ltd."

The Chief Justice frowned at
this breach of court etiquette.

"Have ye not been properly in-
structed?"

Ann shrugged, and the loose robe
slipped lower on her shoulders.

"I suppose so, but is it necessary
to waste all this time? You've got

41

the record in front of you!"

The judges exchanged significant
glances, and a delicious shudder
swept through the stands. Jacques
felt time running out on him. At
best the chances of a reprieve for
any prisoner were small, and in
face of Ann's attitude . . .

The Chief Justice's expression
congealed into judicial impassive-
ness.

"Ye are charged with taking the
life of a man," he began solemnly.

"That's not true!" Ann inter-
rupted.

Her unexpected words brought
a startled gasp from the spectators.
The judges leaned forward alertly.

"According to the evidence . . ."
the Chief Justice began again.

"He wasn't a man!" Ann cried
scornfully. Her glance flickered
across at Jacques. "There are no
more men."

Ponderously, like a slow moving
river that would not be diverted
from its course, the Chief Justice
returned to the facts of the case:

"Ye speak in riddles, Lady Ann!
The evidence makes it full clear
that the victim was a man . . ."

"Evidence!" Ann gestured to-
ward the breathless stands. "There
is your evidence! Ask those women
what they are doing here! Ask
them what their great, great grand-
mothers were doing at the ancient
wrestling matches!! Ask them if
they have ever known a real man —
or ask your own wives!"

The Chief Justice's impassive-
ness was shattered. His cheeks
puffed out indignantly. A strange,
tense silence gripped the women in
the stands; the men drew back

42

their padded shoulders, and shout-
ed in reproof :

"Shame! For shame. Lady Ann!"

"Why don't you ask them?" Ann
persisted.

Yes, ask them, Jacques thought,
with a sudden, overpowering anger
of his own. Ask them ! Maybe their
answers would tell why he, too, of
all men, should have failed so many
of them.

"Hold thy insolent tongue, wom-
an!" roared the Chief Justice.
"There remains before this Court
only one issue — -Did ye or did ye
not strike a man to his death in the
full view of scores of gentilmen and
gentilwoomcn of Coberly?"

Ann shook her long hair in de-
fiance.

"It wasn't a man I struck with
that casing, and all the FIBT's
heraldic mockery can't make him a
man! I struck a bloodless slide-rule,
a cold filing cabinet full of equa-
tions, a set of dull geometric pat-
terns, an automaton that tried to
treat a woman like a punched hol-
rith card! He was no more a man
than this. . ." She brought her el-
bow up so sharply that the paunchy
Bailiff was toppled off balance and
nearly fell. He looked frightened.

"Ye admit to the killing, then?"
demanded the Chief Justice.

"Fm proud of it!"

"And ye claim no special cir-
cumstances?"

"How would you understand
them?"

The crowd exploded into a fran-
tic, unintelligible babble, and the
Chief Justice slammed down his
gavel. He turned to his fellow
judges. Two were staring at the

FRANK RILEY

prisoner with an indignation that
exceeded his own. The other two,
both very old men, sat with heads
bowed and hands fumbling with
their robes.

Jacques felt his pulse leap with a
hope that had seemed impossible.
Could it be that after all. . .? Ann
turned toward him, faltering for
the first time, and they stared into
each other's eyes.

At a curt nod from the Chief
Justice, the Bailiff, still trembling,
began to poll the Court.

The first two judges angrily
raised their hands to signify that
they were voting to uphold the
death sentence of the lower court.
The third judge hesitated, then
held out both hands, palms down.

This brought an outburst of ap-
plause from the stands. The first
palms-down vote always evoked
such a demonstration, for a one-
sided execution was a comparative-
ly dull affair.

But the applause was choked off
as the fourth judge slowly extended
both hands, palms down. A scat-
tering of boos and catcalls started.
An ugly undercurrent rippled close
to the surface. Was this woman
going to win a reversal, in spite of
all her insolence? If she did, the
whole holiday would be spoiled,
since there were no other execu-
tions on the docket. Better to have
stayed home and watched films of
old executions on the FBIT's
nightly vidcast!

Jacques looked away from Ann
to watch the Chief Justice. The
lines in Jacques' face were like
gouges in a metal casting.

Acutely aware of his role, the

THE EXECUTIONER

Chief Justice stood up and drew
his robe about him with great dig-
nity, taking care to face toward the
TV cameras on the north tower.

And as the Bailiff called for his
deciding vote, the Chief Justice
solemnly raised his right hand.

Three to two for death! A hun-
dred thousand spectators leaped to
their feet, hysterically waving their
arms. Three shots for the Lord
High Executioner! Two for Lady
Ann! What a day this was going to
be after all! Here was a truly great
joute a I'outrance! Ann swayed a
little, then smiled. Jacques closed
his eyes.

Ritual and habit took over where
Jacques' will could not function.
His squire stepped forward, opened
the silver box and offered the Pis-
tolets du Mort to the Bailiff. The
weapons sparkled in the sunlight.
They were a modern adaptation of
an ancient design, and had become
official death weapons after earlier
experiments had convinced the
FBIT that few 22nd century men
were strong enough to handle the
swords and lances of chivalry. The
Bailiff loaded one gun with two
shells, the other with three. Then
he replaced both in the silver box,
closed the lid and put the box on
the bench in front of the Chief
Justice.

Already the judicial platform
was wheeled to one side of the
arena; the twin pedestals were be-
ing rolled to position in the ex-
ecution circle. They were thirty
inches high, and were positioned
precisely sixty feet apart, each on
a line with the open ends of the
stands so that wild shots would not

43

strike a spectator.

Next came the Ceremony of Con-
frontation, intended to symbolize
that the Lord High Executioner
was acting only under the compul-
sion of duty, without malice or any
base motive.

Moving mechanically, Jacques
stepped toward Ann. The jailers
crossed their staffs two paces in
front of her. It was the closest
Jacques would be permitted to ap-
proach until the Ceremony of the
Spirit, when he would kneel beside
her shattered body in the dust of
the arena. He also was supposed to
kneel now, and silently speak a
prayer for both their souls. He
knelt, but could not bow his head.
Ann looked down at him, and the
faint, unfathomable smile returned
to her lips.

"It's all right," she said softly.
"You don't have to speak to me
with words."

The natural, warm scent of her
body came through the fragrance of
the oils with which she had been
anointed in her death cell. It was
a remembered scent that once
again drove Jacques to the brink
of madness.

Her voice, husky and steadying,
came down to him:

"For two like us there is no other
way, Jacques. Don't fail me again."

He rose stiffly, backing away,
staring into the mystery of the
lights and shadows in her wide
eyes, groping for the meaning of
her words.

A friar moved up to take his
place, and the jailers dropped their
staffs. But Ann dismissed the friar
with a quick shake of her head.

44

The Code now called for Jacques
to leave the platform and walk with
measured steps around the arena
before mounting his pedestal in the
execution circle. A signal from the
trumpets started him on his way
before he was aware of what he
was doing. The habits of a thou-
sand executions demanded obe-
dience.

Women in the front rows leaned
far over the railing. Some reached
their hands down to him, offering
flowers and kerchiefs, hoarsely beg-
ging him to wear their favors dur-
ing the execution. Others sat still,
transfixed, lips parted and moist.
The men beside them shrank back
in their seats, looking at him as a
sparrow would look at a coiled
snake. Vendors of ribbands and
souvenirs, cakes and drink, stood
silent as he passed before them.
The flutes, citterns and cymbals,
the melodic voices of the minstrels,
picked up the brooding death
chanson :

"Farewell my friends, the tyde
abideth no man,

I am departed from hence, and
so shall ye;

But in this passage the best songe
that I can

Is requiem eternam. . ."

The walk around the arena was
an eternity, and then it was over
and done with, and he had mount-
ed his pedestal.

A low crescendo, like the roll of
faraway surf, swept across the
stands. Ann was at the edge of the
platform. She stepped out of her
slippers, unfastened the velvet robe,
handed it to one of the jailers. The

FRANK RILEY

crescendo grew, matching the surge
of blood in Jacques' temples. A
breeze swept the translucent death
gown tight against her bare body,
and she walked steadily down the
steps, across the arena. Her feet
stirred little puffs of grey dust that
twisted and whirled away. The
friar followed a few paces behind.
At the pedestal, he offered her his
hand. She refused it, stepped up
without assistance. Bowing his
head, the friar walked back to the
judge's platform.

Jacques' squire and a page boy
appeared almost immediately. They
walked part way across the arena
together. Each bore one of the
pistols on a black satin pillow. At
the edge of the execution circle,
their paths forked toward each of
the pedestals. The trembling page
offered Ann her pistol first.

"Do ye remember your instruc-
tions?" he asked in a quavering
voice that was picked up for the
vidcast by the microphone hung
under his frock.

"Yes, thank you."

Ann held the pistol loosely at her
side, and looked toward Jacques,
across the abyss of sixty feet.

With frozen fingers, Jacques ac-
cepted the other pistol from his
squire, and knew that he was out
beyond the point of no returning.

But he did not, could not, know
what he would do once the signal
for the execution was given. "Do
not fail me again," Ann had plead-
ed. But what had she meant? Even
at this final moment her smOe was
as enigmatic as ever.

The page and the squire retreat-
ed to their stations at the side of

THE EXECUTIONER

the arena, this time moving hastily.

The Bailiff raised his black staff
and pennant, held it poised until
the Chief Justice nodded, then
lowered it with a flourish. A trum-
pet sounded one high, clear note.

The signal had been given.

Jacques remained motionless,
waiting for a sign from Ann. But
she, too, waited, her chin slightly
lifted. What was she waiting for?
What did she expect from him?

In the stands, the breathing of a
hundred thousand people was a
rasping sound.

And then Ann moved, so quickly
that the surprise was complete. Her
pistol flashed up, fired while still in
its arc. The bullet blasted the air
beside Jacques' ear, so close that
for a fraction of a second he
thought he had been hit.

Ann's voice drifted across to him,
across the stunned silence, and it
contained both a taunt and a plea :

"I won't miss next time,
Jacques!"

And he knew she would not. He
had seen too many guns fired not
to recognize technique. If she had
learned to shoot that well, there
was no doubt she could have hit
him the first time.

Jacques still couldn't fathom her
motive, but there was no longer
any chance to consider it. His con-
scious mind wanted to let her fire
again, to put an end to this ter-
rible dream. But the instinct of
self-preservation was too strong;
the lessons at the FBIT academy
had been taught too well. Numb-
ness went out of liim, and he
watched her eyes for the telltale
(Continued on page 114)

45

LIFE HUTCH

There was no way out. Death

in the form of a robot had

come to live with him. He

was going to die. Unless . . .

BY HARLAN ELLISON

Illustrated by Ed Emsh

TERRENGE SLID his right
hand, the one out of sight of
the robot, up his side. The razoring
pain of the three broken ribs caused
his eyes to widen momentarily in
pain.

// the eyeballs click, I'm dead,
thought Terrence.

The intricate murmurings of the
Hfe hutch around him brought back
the immediacy of his situation. His
eyes again fastened on the medicine
cabinet clamped to the wall next to
the robot's duty-niche.

Cliche. So near yet so far. It
could be all the way back on. An-
tares-Base for all the good it's doing
me, he thought, and a crazy laugh
trembled on his lips. He caught
himself just in time. Easy! Three
days is a nightmare, but cracking
up will only make it end sooner.

He flexed the fingers of his right
hand. It was all he could move.
Silently he damned the technician
who had passed the robot through.
Or the politician who had let in-
ferior robots get placed in the life
hutches so he could get a rake-off
from the government contract. Or
the repairman who hadn't bothered
checking closely his last time
around. All of them; he damned
them all.

They deserved it,

He was dying.

He let his eyes close completely,
let the sounds of the life hutch
fade from around him. Slowly the
sound of the coolants hush-hushing
through the wall-pipes, the relay
machines feeding without pause
their messages from all over the
Galaxy, the whirr of the antenna's
standard turning in its socket atop

46

the bubble, slowly they melted into
silence. He had resorted to blocking
himself ofT from reality many times
during the past three days. It was
either that or existing with the
robot watching, and eventually he
would have had to move. To move

was to die. It was that simple.

He closed his ears to the whisper-
ings of the life hutch; he listened to
the whisperings within himself.

To his mind came the sounds of
war, across the gulf of space. It was
all imagination, yet he could clear-

47

ly detect the hiss of his scout's blast-
er as it poured beam after beam
into the lead ship of the Kyben
fleet.

His sniper-class scout had been
near the face of that deadly Terran
phalanx, driving like a wedge at the
alien ships, converging on them in
loose battle-formation. It was then
it had happened.

One moment he had been head-
ing into the middle of the battle,
the left flank of the giant Kyben
dreadnaught turning crimson under
the impact of his firepower.

The next moment, he had skit-
tered out of the formation which
had slowed to let the Kyben craft
come in closer, while the Earthmen
decelerated to pick up maneuver-
ability.

He had gone on at the old level
and velocity, directly into the for-
ward guns of a toadstool-shaped
Kyben destroyer.

The first beam had burned the
gun-mounts and directional equip-
ment off the front of the ship,
scorching down the aft side in a
smear like oxidized chrome plate.
He had managed to avoid the sec-
ond beam.

His radio contact had been brief;
he was going to make it back to
Antares-Base if he could. If not,
the formation would be listening
for his homing-beam from a life
hutch on whatever planetoid he
might find for a crash-landing.

Which was what he had done.
The charts had said the pebble
spinning there was technically
1-333, 2-A, M & S, 3-804.39#,
which would have meant nothing
but three-dimensional co-ordinates,

48

had not the small # after the data
indicated a life hutch somewhere
on its surface.

His distaste for being knocked
out of the fighting, being forced
onto one of the life hutch planet-
oids, had been offset only by his
fear of running out of fuel before
he could locate himself. Of even-
tually drifting off into space some-
where, to finally wind up as an
artificial satellite around some
minor sun.

The ship pancaked in under
minimal reverse drive, bounced
high and skittered along, tearing
out chunks of the rear section; but
had come to rest a scant two miles
from the life hutch, jammed into
the rocks.

Terrence had high-leaped the
two miles across the empty, airless
planetoid to the hermetically-sealed
bubble in the rocks. His primary
wish was to set the hutch's beacon
signal so his returning fleet could
track him.

He had let himself into the de-
compression chamber, palmed the
switch through his thick spacesuit
glove, and finally removed his hel-
met as he heard the air whistle into
the chamber.

He had pulled off his gloves,
opened the inner door and entered
the life hutch itself.

God bless you, little life hutch,
Terrence had thought as he
dropped the helmet and gloves. He
had glanced around, noting the re-
lay machines, picking up messages
from outside, sorting them, vector-
ing them off in other directions. He
had seen the medicine chest
clamped onto the wall, the refriger-

HARLAN ELLISON

ator he knew would be well-stocked
if a previous tenant hadn't been
there before the stockman could re-
fill it. He had seen the all-purpose
robot, immobile in its duty-niche.
And the wall-chronometer, its face
smashed. All of it in a second's
glance.

God bless, too, the gentlemen
who thought up the idea of these
little rescue stations, stuck all over
the place for just such emergencies
as this. He had started to walk
across the room.

It was at this point that the serv-
ice robot, who kept the place in re-
pair between tenants and unloaded
supplies from the ships, had moved
clankingly across the floor, and
with one fearful smash of a steel
arm thrown Terrence across the
room.

The spaceman had been brought
up short against the steel bulkhead,
pain blossoming in his back, his
side, his arms and legs. The ma-
chine's blow had instantly broken
three of his ribs. He lay there for a
moment, unable to move. For a few
seconds he was too stunned to
breathe, and it had been that, per-
haps, that had saved his life. His
pain had immobilized him, and in
that short space of time the robot
had retreated, with a muted in-
ternal clash of gears, to its niche.

He had attempted to sit up
straight, and the robot had
hummed oddly and begun to move.
He had stopped the movement. The
robot had settled back.

Twice more had convinced him
his position was as bad as he had
thought.

The robot had worn down some-

LIFE HUTCH

where in its printed circuits. Its
commands distorted so that now
it was conditioned to smash, to hit,
anything that moved.

He had seen the clock. He real-
ized he should have suspected some-
thing was wrong when he saw its
smashed face. Of course ! The hands
had moved, the robot had smashed
the clock. Terrence had moved, the
robot had smashed him.

And would again, if he moved
again.

But for the unnoticeable move-
ment of his eyelids, he had not
moved in three days.

He had tried moving toward the
decompression lock, stopping when
the robot advanced and letting it
settle back, then moving again, a
little nearer. But the idea died with
his first movement. The agonizing
pain of the crushed ribs made such
maneuvering impossible. He was
frozen into position, an uncomfort-
able, twisted position, and he would
be there till the stalemate ended,
one way or the other.

He was twelve feet away from
the communications panel, twelve
feet away from the beacon that
would guide his rescuers to him.
Before he died of his wounds, be-
fore he starved to death, before the
robot crushed him. It could have
been twelve light-years, for all the
difference it made.

What had gone wrong with the
robot? Time to think was cheap.
The robot could detect movement,
but thinking was still possible. Not
that it could help, but it was pos-
sible.

The companies who supplied the
life hutch's needs were aJl govern-

49

ment contracted. Somewhere along
the line someone had thrown in
impure steel or calibrated the cir-
cuit-cutting machines for a less ex-
pensive job. Somewhere along the
line someone had not run the robot
through its paces correctly. Some-
where along the line someone had
committed murder.

He opened his eyes again. Only
the barest fraction of opening. Any
more and the robot would sense
the movement of his eyelids. That
would be fatal.

He looked at the machine.

It was not, strictly speaking, a
robot. It was merely a remote-con-
trolled hunk of jointed steel, in-
valuable for making beds, stacking
steel plating, watching culture
dishes, unloading spaceships and
sucking dirt from rugs. The robot
body, roughly humanoid, but with-
out what would have been a head
in a human, was merely an ap-
pendage.

The real brain, a complex maze
of plastic screens and printed cir-
cuits, was behind the wall. It would
have been too dangerous to install
those delicate parts in a heavy-duty
mechanism. It was all too easy for
the robot to drop itself from a load-
ing shaft, or be hit by a meteorite,
or get caught under a wrecked
spaceship. So there were sensitive
units in the robot appendage that
"saw" and "heard" what was going
on, and relayed them to the brain
— behind the wall.

And somewhere along the line
that brain had worn grooves too
deeply into its circuits. It was now
mad. Not mad in any way a human
being might go mad, for there were

50

an infinite number of ways a ma-
chine could go insane. Just mad
enough to kill Terrence.

Even if I could hit the robot
with something, it wouldn't stop
the thing. He could perhaps throw
something at the machine before it
could get to him, but it would do
no good. The robot brain would
still be intact, and the appendage
would continue to function. It was
hopeless.

He stared at the massive hands
of the robot. It seemed he could
see his own blood on the jointed
work-tool fingers of one hand. He
knew it must be his imagination,
but the idea persisted. He flexed
the fingers of his hidden hand.

Three days had left him weak
and dizzy from hunger. His head
was light and his eyes burned
steadily. He had been lying in his
own filth till he no longer noticed
the discomfort. His side ached and
throbbed, the pain like a hot spear
thrust into him every time he
breathed.

He thanked God his spacesuit
was still on, else his breathing
would have brought the robot down
on him. There was only one solu-
tion, and that solution was his
death.

Terrence had never been a cow-
ard, nor had he been a hero. He
was one of the men who fight wars
because they must be fought by
someone. He was the kind of man
who would allow himself to be torn
from wife and home and flung into
an abyss they called Space because
of something else they called Loy-
alty and another they called Pa-

HARLAN ELLISON

triotism. To defend what he had
been told needed defense. But it
was in moments like this that a
man like Terrence began to think.

Why here? Why like this? What
have I done that I should finish in
a filthy spacesuit on a lost rock —
and not gloriously but starving or
bleeding to death alone with a
crazy robot? Why me? Why me?
Why?

He knew there could be no an-
swers. He expected no answers.

He was not disappointed.

WHEN HE awoke, he instinc-
tively looked at the clock. Its
shattered face looked back at him,
jarring him, forcing his eyes open
in after-sleep terror. The robot
hummed and emitted a spark. He
kept his eyes open. The humming
ceased. His eyes began to burn. He
knew he couldn't keep them open
too long.

The burning worked its way to
the front of his eyes, from the top
and bottom, bringing with it tears.
It felt as though someone were
shoving needles into the soft orbs.
The tears ran down over his cheeks.

His eyes snapped shut. The roar-
ing grew in his ears. The robot
didn't make a sound.

Could it he inoperative? Could
it have worn down to immobility?
Could he take the chance of ex-
perimenting?

He slid down to a more com-
fortable position. The robot
charged forward the instant he
moved. He froze in mid-movement,
his heart a lump of snow. The
robot stopped, confused, a scant

LIFE HUTCH

ten inches from his outstretched
foot. The machine hummed to it-
self, the noise of it coming both
from the machine before him and
from somewhere behind the wall.

He was suddenly alert.

If it had been working correctly,
there would have been little or no
sound from the appendage, and
none whatsoever from the brain.
But it was not working properly,
and the sound of its thinking was
distinct.

The robot rolled backward, its
"eyes" still toward Terrence. The
sense orbs of the machine were in
the torso, giving the machine the
look of a squat gargoyle of metal,
squared and deadly.

The humming was growing loud-
er, every now and then a sharp
pfffft! of sparks mixed with it. Ter-
rence had a moment's horror at
the thought of a short-circuit, a
fire in the life hutch, and no service
robot to put it out.

He listened carefully to figure
out where the robot's brain was
built into the wall.

Then he thought he had it. Or
was it there? It was either in the
wall behind a bulkhead next to the
refrigerator, or behind a bulkhead
near the relay machines. The two
possible housings were within a few
feet of each other, but it might
make a great deal of difference.

The distortion created by the
steel plate in front of the brain,
and the distracting background
noise of the robot broadcasting it
made it difficult to tell exactly
which was it.

He drew a deep breath.

The ribs slid a fraction of an

51

inch together, their broken ends
grinding.

He moaned.

A high-pitched tortured moan
that died quickly, but throbbed
back and forth inside his head,
echoing and building itself into a
paen of sheer agony! It forced his
tongue out of his mouth, limp in a
corner of his lips, moving slightly.
The robot rolled forward. He drew
his tongue in, clamped his mouth
shut, cut off the scream inside his
head at its high point!

The robot stopped, rolled back
to its duty-niche.

Beads of sweat broke out on his
body. He could feel them trickling
inside his spacesuit, inside his jump-
er, inside the undershirt, on his
skin. The pain of the ribs was sud-
denly heightened by an irresistible
itching.

He moved an infinitesimal bit
within the suit, his outer appear-
ance giving no indication of the
movement. The itching did not
subside. The more he tried to make
it stop, the more he thought about
not thinking about it, the worse it
became. His armpits, the bends of
his arms, his thighs where the tight
service-pants clung — suddenly too
tightly — were madness. He had to
scratch!

He almost started to make the
movement. He stopped before he
started. He knew he would never
live to enjoy any relief. A laugh
bubbled into his head. God Al-
mighty, and I always laughed at
the joes who suffered with the
seven-year itch, the ones who al-
ways did a little dance when they
were at attention during inspection,

52

the ones who could scratch and sigh
contentedly. God, how I envy them.

The prickling did not stop. He
twisted faintly. It got worse. He
took another deep breath.

The ribs sandpapered again.

This time he fainted from the
pain.

"Well, Terrence, how do you
like your first look at a Kyben?"

Ernie Terrence wrinkled his
forehead and ran a finger up the
side of his face. He looked at his
Commander and shrugged. "Fan-
tastic things, aren't they?"

"Why fantastic?" asked Com-
mander Foley.

"Because they're just like us. Ex-
cept of course the bright yellow
pigmentation and the tentacle-fin-
gers. Other than that they're iden-
tical to a human being."

The Commander opaqued the
examination-casket and drew a
cigarette from a silver case, offer-
ing the Lieutenant one. He puffed
it alight, staring with one eye
closed against the smoke, at the
younger man beside him. "More
than that, I'm afraid. Their insides
look like someone had taken them
out, liberally mixed them with
spare parts from several other
species, and thrown them back in
any way that fitted conveniently.
For the next twenty years we'll be
knocking our heads together trying
to figure out how they exist."

Terrence grunted, rolling his un-
lit cigarette absently between two
fingers. "That's the least of it."

"You're right," agreed the Com-
mander. "For the next thousand
years we'll be trying to figure out

HARLAN ELLISON

how they think, why they fight,
what it takes to get along with
them, what motivates them."

If they let us live that long
thought Terrence.

"Why are we at war with the
Kyben?" he asked the older man.
"I mean really."

"Because the Kyben want to kill
every human being that can real-
ize he's a human being."

"What have they got against us?"

"Does it matter? Perhaps it's be-
cause our skin isn't bright yellow;
perhaps it's because our fingers
aren't silken and flexible; perhaps
it's because our cities are too noisy
for them. Perhaps a lot of perhaps.
But it doesn't matter. Survival
never matters until you have to
survive."

Terrence nodded. He under-
stood. So did the Kyben. It grinned
at him and drew its blaster. It fired
point-blank, crimsoning the hull of
the Kyben ship.

He swerved to avoid running
into his gun's own backlash. The
movement of the bucket seat sliding
in its tracks to keep his vision steady
while maneuvering made him dizzy.

The abyss was nearer, and he
teetered, his lips whitening as they
pressed together under his effort to
steady himself. With a headlong
gasp he fell sighing into the stom-
ach. His long, silken fingers jointed
steely humming clankingly toward
the medicine chest over the plate
behind the bulkhead.

The robot advanced on him
grindingly. Small fine bits of metal
rubbed together, ashing away into
a breeze that came from nowhere
as the machine raised lead boots

LIFE HUTCH

toward his face.

Onward and onward till he had
no room to move.

The light came on, bright, bright-
er than any star Terrence had ever
seen, glowing, broiling, flickering,
shining, bobbing a ball of light on
the chest of the robot, who stag-
gered, stumbled, stopped.

The robot hissed, hummed and
exploded into a million flying, rac-
ing, fragments, shooting beams of
light all over the abyss over which
Terrence teetered. He flailed his
arms back trying to escape at the
last moment, before the fall.

He saved himself only by his sub-
conscious. Even in the hell of a
nightmare he was aware of the
situation. He had not moaned and
writhed in his delirium. He had
kept motionless and silent.

He knew this was true, because
he was still alive.

Only his surprised jerking, as he
came back to consciousness started
the monster rolling from its niche.
He came fully awake and sat silent,
slumped against the wall. The robot
retreated.

Thin breath came through his
nostrils. Another moment and he
would have put an end to the past
three days — three days or more
now? how long had he been asleep?
— of torture.

He was hungry. Lord how hun-
gry he was. The pain in his side
was worse now, a steady throbbing
that made even shallow breathing
tortuous. He itched maddeningly.
He was uncomfortably slouched
against a cold steel bulkhead, every
rivet having made a burrow for it-

53

self in his skin. He wished he were
dead.

He didn't wish he was dead. It
was all too easy to get his wish.

If he could only disable that
robot brain. A total impossibility.
If he could only wear Phobos and
Deimos for watchfobs. If he could
only shack-up with a silicon-deb
from Penares. If he could only use
his large colon for a lasso.

It would take a total wrecking
of the brain to do it enough damage
to stop the appendage before it
could roll over and smash Ter-
rence again.

With a steel bulkhead between
him and the brain, his chances of
success totaled minus zero every
time.

He considered which part of his
body the robot would smash first.
One blow of that tool-hand would
kill him if it were used a second
time. On top of the ribs, even a
strong breath might finish him.

Perhaps he could make a break
and get into the air chamber . . .

Worthless. A) The robot would
catch him before he had gotten to
his feet, in his present condition.
B) Even allowing for a miracle, if
he did get in there, the robot would
smash the lock doors, letting in air,
ruining the mechanism. C) Even
allowing for a double miracle what
the hell good would it do him? His
helmet and gloves were in the
hutch itself, and there was no place
to go on the planetoid. The ship
was ruined, so no signal could be
sent from there.

Doom suddenly compounded it-
self.

The more he thought about it,

54

the more certain he was that soon
the light would flicker out for him.

The light would flicker out.

The light would flicker . . .

The light . . .

. . .light . . .?

His God, if he had had anything
to do with it, had heard him. Ter-
rence was by no means a religious
man, but this was miracle enough
to make even him a disciple. It
wasn't over yet, but the answer was
there — and it was an answer.

He began to save himself.

Slowly, achingly slowly, he
moved his right hand, the hand
away from the robot's sight, to his
belt. On the belt hung the assorted
implements a spaceman needs at
any moment in his ship. A wrench.
A packet of sleep-stavers. A com-
pass. A geiger counter. A flashlight.

The last was the miracle. Miracle
in a tube.

He fingered it almost reverently,
then undipped it in a moment's
frenzy, still immobile to the robot's
"eyes."

He held it at his side, away from
his body by a fraction of an inch,
pointing up over the bulge of his
spacesuited leg.

If the robot looked at him, all
it would see would be the motion-
less bulk of his leg, blocking off any
movement on his part. To the ma-
chine, he was inert. Motionless.

Now he thought wildly, where is
the brain?

If it is behind the relay machines,
I'm still dead. If it is near the re-
frigerator, I'm saved. He could
afford to take no chances. He would
have to move.

HARLAN ELLISON

He lifted one leg.

The robot moved toward him.
The humming and sparking was
distinct this time. He dropped the
leg.

Behind the plates above the re-
frigerator!

The robot stopped, nearly at his
side. Seconds had decided. The
robot hummed, sparked, and re-
turned to its niche.

Now he knew!

He pressed the button. The in-
visible beam of the flashlight
leaped out, speared at the bulk-
head above the refrigerator. He
pressed the button again and again,
the flat circle of light appearing,
disappearing, appearing, disappear-
ing on the faceless metal of the life
hutch's wall.

The robot sparked and rolled
from its niche. It looked once at
Terrence. Then its rollers changed
direction and the machine ground
toward the refrigerator.

The steel fist swung in a vicious

arc, smashing with a deafening
clang at the spot where the light
bubble flickered on and off.

It swung again and again. Again
and again till the bulkhead had
been gouged and crushed and
opened, and the delicate coils and
plates and wires and tubes behind
it were refuse and rubble. Until the
robot froze, with arm half-ready
to strike again. Dead. Immobile.
Brain and appendage.

Even then Terrence did not stop
pressing the flashlight button. Wild-
ly he thumbed it down and down.

Suddenly he realized it was all
over.

The robot was dead. He was
alive. He would be saved. He had
no doubts about that. Now he
could cry.

The medicine chest grew large
through the shimmering in his eyes.
The relay machines smiled at him.

God bless you, little life hutch,
he thought, before he fainted.

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LIFE HUTCH

ATO

DRIVE

BY CHARLES FONTENAY

It was a race between the tortoise and the hare.

But this hare was using some dirty tricks to

make sure the ending would be different . . .

Illustrated by Ed Emsh

THE TWO spaceship crews were
friendly enemies, sitting across
the table from each other for their
last meal before blastoff. Outside
the ports, the sky was nothing but
light-streaked blackness, punctured
periodically by Earth glare, for
Space Station 2 whirled swiftly on
its axis, creating an artificial grav-
ity.

"Jonner, I figured you the last
man ever to desert the rockets for
a hot-rod tow-job," chided Russo
Baat, captain of the Mars Corpora-
tion's gleaming new freighter,
Marsward XVIII. Baat was fat
and red-faced, and one of the

shrewdest space captains in the
business.

Jonner Jons, at the other end of
the table, inclined his grizzled head
and smiled.

"Times change, Russo," he an-
swered quietly. "Even the Mars
Corporation can't stop that."

"Is it true that you're pulling
five thousand tons of cargo. Cap-
tain?" asked one of the crewmen
of the Marsward XVIII.

"Something like that," agreed
Jonner, and his smile broadened.
"And I have only about twice the
fuel supply you carry for a 100-ton
payload."

57

The communicator above them
squawked and blared:

"Captain Jons and Captain Baat
of Martian competition run, please
report to control for final briefing."

"I knew it!" grumbled Baat, get-
ting heavily and reluctantly to his
feet. "I haven't gotten to finish a
meal on this blasted merry-go-
round yet."

In the space station's control sec-
tion. Commander Ortega of the
Space Control Commission, an as-
cetic officer in plain blues, looked
them up and down severely,

"As you know, gentlemen," he
said, "blastoff time is 0600. Ton-
nage of cargo, fuel and empty ves-
sels carmot be a factor, under the
law. The Mars Corporation will
retain its exclusive franchise to the
Earth-Mars run, unless the ship
sponsored by the Atom-Star Com-
pany returns to Earth with full
cargo at least twenty hours ahead
of the ship sponsored by the Mars
Corporation. Cargo must be un-
loaded at Mars and new cargo
taken on. I do not consider the
twenty-hour bias in favor of the
Mars Corporation a fair one," said
Ortega severely, turning his gaze
to Baat, "but the Space Control
Commission does not make the
laws. It enforces them. Docking
and loading facilities will be avail-
able to both of you on an equal
basis at Phobos and Marsport.
Good luck."

He shook hands with both of
them.

"Saturn, I'm glad to get out of
there!" exclaimed Baat, mopping
his brow as they left the control
section. "Every time I take; a step,

58

I feel like I'm falling on my face."

"It's because the control section's
so close to the center," replied
Jonner. "The station's spinning to
maintain artificial gravity, and
your feet are away from the center.
As long as you're standing upright,
the pull is straight up and down to
you, but actually your feet are mov-
ing faster than your head, in a
larger orbit. When you try to move,
as in normal gravity, your body
swings out of that line of pull and
you nearly fall. The best corrective,
I've found, is to lean backward
slightly when you start to walk."

As the two space captains walked
back toward the wardroom togeth-
er, Baat said:

"Jonner, I hear the Mars Cor-
poration offered you the Marsward
XVIII for this run first, and you
turned them down. Why? You
piloted the Marsward V and the
Wayward Lady for Marscorp when
those upstarts in the Argentine
were trying to crack the Earth-
Mars run. This Atom-Star couldn't
have enough money to buy you
away from Marscorp."

"No, Marscorp offered me
more," said Jonner, soberly now.
"But this atomic drive is the future
of space travel, Russo. Marscorp
has it, but they're sitting on it be-
cause they've got their fingers in
hydrazine interests here, and the
atom drive will make hydrazine use-
less for space fuel. Unless I can
break the franchise for Atom-Star,
it may be a hundred years before
we switch to the atom drive in
space."

"What the hell difference does
that make to you?" asked Baat

CHARLES FONTENAY

bluntly.

"Hydrazine's expensive," replied
Joiiner. "Reaction mass isn't, and
you use less of it. I was bom on
Mars, Russo. Mars is my home,
and I want to see my people get
the supplies they need from Earth
at a reasonable transport cost, not
pay through the nose for every
packet of vegetable seed."

They reached the wardroom
door.

"Too bad I have to degrav my
old chief," said Baat, chuckling.
"But I'm a rocket man, myself,
and I say to hell with your hot-rod
atom drive. I'm sorry you got de-
flected into this run, Jonner; you'll
never break Marscorp's orbit."

The Marsward XVIII was a
huge vessel, the biggest the Mars
Corporation ever had put into
space. It was a collection of spheres
and cylinders, joined together by
a network of steel ties. Nearly 90%
of its weight was fuel, for the one-
way trip to Mars.

Its competitor, the Radiant
Hope, riding ten miles away in
orbit around the Earth, was the
strangest looking vessel ever to get
clearance from a space station. It
looked like a tug towing a barge.
The tug was the atomic power
plant. Two miles behind, attached
by a thin cable, was the passenger
compartment and cargo.

On the control deck of the
Radiant Hope, Jonner gripped a
microphone and shouted profane
instructions at the pilot of a squat
ground-to-space rocket twenty miles
away. T'an Li Cho, the ship's en-
gineer, was peering out the port at

ATOM DRIVE

the speck of light toward which
Jonner was directing his wrath,
while Qoqol, the Martian astroga-
tor, worked at his charts on the
other side of the deck.

"I thought all cargo was aboard,
Jonner," said T'an.

"It is," said Jonner, laying the
mike aside. "That G-boat isn't
hauling cargo. It's going with us.
I'm not taking any chances on
Marscorp refusing to ferry our
cargo back and forth at Mars."

"Is plotted, Jonner," boomed
Qoqol, turning his head to peer
at them with huge eyes through the
spidery tangle of his thin, double-
jointed arms and legs. He reached
an eight-foot arm across the deck
and handed Jonner his figures. Jon-
ner gave them to T'an.

"Figure out power for that one,
T'an," ordered Jonner, and took
his seat in the cushioned control
chair.

T'an pulled a slide rule from his
tunic pocket, but his black almond
eyes rested quizzically on Jonner.

"It's four hours before blastoff,"
he reminded.

"I've cleared power for this with
Space Control," replied Jonner.
"That planet-loving G-boat jockey
missed orbit. We'll have to swing
out a little and go to him."

On a conventional space craft,
the order for acceleration would
have sent the engineer to the engine
deck to watch his gauges and report
by intercom. But the Radiant
Hope's "engine deck" was the
atomic tug two miles ahead, which
T'an, in heavy armor, would enter
only in emergencies. He calculated
for a moment, then called softly

59

to Jonner:

"Pile One, in ten."

"In ten," confirmed Jonner, pull-
ing a lever on the calibrated gauge
of the radio control.

"Pile Two, in fifteen."

"In fifteen."

"Check. I'll have the length of
burst figured for you in a jiffy."

A faint glow appeared around
the atomic tug far ahead, and there
was the faintest shiver in the ship.
But after a moment, Qoqol said in
a puzzled tone :

"No Gs, Jonner. Engine not
work?"

"Sure, she's working," said Jon-
ner with a grin. "You'll never get
any more G than we've got now,
Qoqol, all the way to Mars. Our
maximum acceleration will be 1/3,
OOOth-G."

"One three-thousandth?" ex-
claimed T'an, shaken out of his
Oriental calm. "Jonner, the Mars-
ward will blast away at one or two
Gs. How do you expect to beat
that at l/3,000th?"

"Because they have to cut off
and coast most of the way in an
elliptic orbit, like any other rocket,"
answered Jonner calmly. "We drive
straight across the system, under
power all the time. We accelerate
half way, decelerate the other half."

"But 1 /3,000th!"

"You'll be surprised at what con-
stant power can do. I know Baat,
and I know the trick he's going to
use. It's obvious from the blastoff
time they arranged. He's going to
tack off the Moon and use his
power right to cut 20 days off that
regular 237-day schedule. But this
tug-boat will make it in 154 days!"

60

They took aboard the 200-ton
landing boat. By the time they got
it secured, the radio already was
sounding warnings for blastoff.

Zero hour arrived. Again Jonner
pulled levers and again the faint
glow appeared around the tail of
their distant tug. Across space the
exhaust of the Marsward XVIII
flared into blinding flame. In a mo-
ment, it began to pull ahead visibly
and soon was receding like a
meteor.

Near the Radiant Hope, the
space station seemed not to have
changed position at all.

"The race is not always to the
swift," remarked Jonner philo-
sophically.

"And we're the tortoise," said
T'an. "How about filling us in on
this jaunt, Jonner?"

"Is should, Jonner," agreed
Qoqol. "T'an know all about crazy
new engine, I know all about crazy
new orbit. Both not know all. You
tell."

"I planned to, anyway," said
Jonner. "I had figured on having
Serj in on it, but he wouldn't un-
derstand much of it anyhow.
There's no use in waking him up."

Serj was the ship's doctor-psy-
chologist and fourth member of the
crew. He was asleep below on the
centerdeck.

"For your information, Qoqol,"
said Jonner, " the atomic engine
produces electrical energy, which
accelerates reaction mass. Actually,
it's a crude ion engine. T'an can
explain the details to you later, but
the important thing is that the fuel
is cheap, the fuel-to-cargo ratio is
low and constant acceleration is

CHARLES FONTENAY

practical.

"As for you, T'an, I was sur-
prised at your not understanding
why we'll use low acceleration. To
boost the engine power and give us
more Gs, we'd either have to carry
more fuel or coast part of the way
on momentum, like an ordinary
rocket. This way's more efficient,
and our 63-day margin over the
Marsward each way is more than
enough for unloading and loading
more cargo and fuel."

"With those figures, I can't see
how Marscorp expects to win this
competition," said T'an.

"We've got them, flat, on the
basis of performance," agreed Jon-
ner. "So we'll have to watch
for tricks. I know Marscorp. That's
why I arranged to take aboard
that G-boat at the last minute.
Marscorp controls all the G-boats
at Marsport, and they're smart
enough to keep us from using them,
in spite of the Space Control Com-
mission. As for refueling for the
return trip, we can knock a chunk
off of Phobos for reaction mass."

The meteor alarm bells clanged
suddenly, and the screen lit up once
with a fast-moving red line that
traced the path of the approaching
object.

"Miss us about half a mile," said
Jonner after a glance at the screen.
"Must be pretty big . . . and it's
coming up!"

He and T'an floated to one of
the ports, and in a few moments
saw the object speed by.

"That's no meteor!" exclaimed
Jonner with a puzzled frown.
"That's man-made. But it's too
small for a G-boat."

ATOM DRIVE

The radio blared: "All craft in
orbit near Space Station 2! Warn-
ing! All craft near Space Station
2! Experimental missile misfired
from White Sands! Repeat: ex-
perimental missile misfired from
White Sands! Coordinates . . ."

"Fine time to tell us," remarked
T'an drily.

"Experimental missile, hell!"
snorted Jonner, comprehension
dawning. "Qoqol, what would have
happened if we hadn't shifted orbit
to take aboard that G-boat?"

Qoqol calculated a moment.

"Hit our engines," he announced.
"Dead center."

Jonner' s blue eyes clouded omi-
nously. "Looks like they're playing
for keeps this time, boys."

THE BROTHERHOOD of
spacemen is an exclusive club.
Any captain, astrogator or engineer
is likely to be well known to his
colleagues, either personally or by
reputation.

The ship's doctor-psychologist is
in a different category. Most of
them sign on for a few runs for the
adventure of it, as a means of get-
ting back and forth between planets
without paying the high cost of
passage or to pick up even more
money than they can get from luc-
rative planetbound practice.

Jonner did not know Serj, the
Radiant Hope's doctor. Neither
T'an nor Qoqol ever had heard of
him. But Serj appeared to know his
business well enough, and was
friendly enough.

It was Serj's first trip and he was
very interested in the way the ship

61

operated. He nosed into every cor-
ner of it and asked a hundred ques-
tions a day.

"You're as inquisitive as a cadet
spaceman, Serj," Jonner told him
on the twenty-fifth day out. Every-
body knew everyone else well by
then, which meant that Jonner and
Qoqol, who had served together be-
fore, had become acquainted with
T'an and Serj.

"There's a lot to see and learn
about space. Captain," said Serj.
He was a young fellow, with fair
hair and an easy grin. "Think I
could go outside?"

"If you keep a lifeline hooked on.
The suits have magnetic shoes to
hold you to the hull of the ship,
but you can lose your footing."

"Thanks," said Serj. He touched
his hand to his forehead and left
the control deck.

Jonner, near the end of his eight-
hour duty shift, watched the dials.

The red light showing the inner
airlock door was open bhnked on.
It blinked off, then the outer air-
lock indicator went on, and off.

A shadow fell across Jonner
briefly. He glanced at the port and
reached for the microphone.

"Careful and don't step on any
of the ports," he warned Serj. "The
magnetic soles won't hold on them."

"I'll be careful, sir," answered
Serj.

No one but a veteran spaceman
would have noticed the faint quiver
that ran through the ship, but Jon-
ner felt it. Automatically, he swung
his control chair and his eyes swept
the bank of dials.

At first he saw nothing. The
outer lock light blinked on and off,

62

then the inner lock indicator. That
was Serj coming back inside.

Then Jonner noted that the hand
on one dial rested on zero. Above
the dial was the word: "ACCEL-
ERATION."

His eyes snapped to the radio
controls. The atomic pile levers
were still at their proper calibra-
tion. The dials above them said the
engines were working properly.

The atomic tug was still accel-
erating, but passengers and cargo
were in free fall.

Swearing Jonner jerked at the
levers to pull out the piles aboard
the tug.

A blue flash flared across the
control board, momentarily blind-
ing him. Jonner recoiled, only his
webbed safety belt preventing him
from plummeting from the control
chair.

He swung back anxiously to the
dials, brushing futilely at the spots
that swam before his eyes. He
breathed a sigh of relief. The radio
controls had operated. The atomic
engines had ceased firing.

Tentatively, cautiously, he re-
versed the lever. There was no
blue flash this time, but neither did
the dials quiver. He swore. Some-
thing had burned out in the radio
controls. He couldn't reverse the
tug.

He punched the general alarm
button viciously, and the raucous
clangor of the bell sounded through
the confines of the ship. One by
one, the other crew members
popped up to the control deck
from below.

He turned the controls over to
Qoqol.

CHARLES FONTENAY

"Take readings on that damn
tug," Jonner ordered. "I think our
cable broke. T'an, let's go take a
look."

When they got outside, they
found about a foot of the one-inch
cable still attached to the ship. The
rest of it, drawn away by the tug
before Jonner could cut accelera-
tion, was out of sight.

"Can it be welded, T'an?"

"It can, but it'll take a while,"
replied the engineer slowly. "First,
we'll have to reverse that tug and
get the other end of that break."

"Damn, and the radio control's
burned out. I tried to reverse it be-
fore I sounded the alarm. T'an,
how fast can you get those controls
repaired?"

"Great space!" exclaimed T'an
softly. "Without seeing it, I'd say
at least two days, Jonner. Those
controls are complicated as hell."

They re-entered the ship. Qoqol
was working at his diagrams, and
Serj was looking over his shoulder.
Jonner took a heat-gun quietly
from the rack and pointed it at
Serj.

"You'll get below, mister," he
commanded grimly. You'll be hand-
cuffed to your bunk from here on
out."

"Sir?. . . I don't understand,"
stammered Serj.

"Like hell you don't. You cut
that cable," Jonner accused.

Serj started to shrug, but he
dropped his eyes.

"They paid me," he said in a low
tone. "They paid me a thousand
solars."

"What good would a thousand
solars do you when you're dead,

ATOM DRIVE

Serj . . . dead of suffocation and
drifting forever in space?"

Serj looked up in astonishment.

"Why, you can still reach Earth
by radio, easy," he said. "It
wouldn't take long for a rescue
ship to reach us."

"Chemical rockets have their
limitations, "said Jonner coldly.

"And you don't realize what
speed we've built up with steady
acceleration. We'd head straight out
of the system, and nothing could
intercept us, if that tug had gotten
too far before we noticed it was
gone."

He jabbed the white-faced doc-
tor with the muzzle of the heat-
gun.

"Get below," he ordered. "I'll
turn you over to Space Control at
Mars."

When Serj had left the control
deck, Jonner turned to the others.
His face was grave.

"That tug picked up speed be-
fore I could shut off the engines,
after the cable was cut," he said.
"It's moving away from us slowly,
and at a tangent. And solar grav-
ity's acting on both bodies now. By
the time we get those controls re-
paired, the drift may be such that
we'll waste weeks maneuvering the
the tug back."

"I could jet out to the tug in a
spacesuit, before it gets too far
away," said T'an thoughtfully. "But
that wouldn't do any good. There's
no way of controlling the engines,
at the tug. It has to be done by
radio."

"If we get out of this, remind me
to recommend that atomic ships
always carry a spare cable," said

63

Jonner gloomily. "If we had one,
we could splice them and hold the
ship to the tug until the controls
are repaired."

"Is cable in cargo strong enough,
Jonner?" asked Qoqol.

"That's right!" exclaimed Jon-
ner, brightening. "Most of our car-
go's cable! That 4,000- ton spool
we're hauling back there is 6,000
miles of cable to lay a television
network between the Martian
cities."

"Television cable?" repeated
T'an doubtfully. "Will that be
strong enough?"

"It's bound in flonite, that new
fluorine compound. It's strong
enough to tow this whole cargo
at a couple of Gs. There's nothing
aboard this ship that would cut off
a length of it — a heat-gun at full
power wouldn't even scorch it — but
we can unwind enough of it, and
block the spool. It'll hold the ship
to the tug until the controls can be
repaired, then we can reverse the
tug and weld the cable."

"You mean the whole 6,000 miles
of it's in one piece?" demanded
T'an in astonishment.

"That's not so much. The cable-
laying steamer Dominia carried
3,000 miles in one piece to lay
Atlantic cables in the early 20th
century."

"But how'll we ever get 4,000
tons in one piece down to Mars?"
asked T'an. "No G-boat can carry
that load."

Jonner chuckled.

"Same way they got it up from
Earth to the ship," he answered.
"They attached one end of it to a
G-boat and sent it up to orbit,

64

then wound it up on a fast winch.
Since the G-boat will be decelerat-
ing to Mars, the unwinding will
have to be slowed or the cable
would tangle itself all over Syrtis."

"Sounds like it's made to order,"
said T'an, grinning. "I'll get into
my spacesuit."

"You'll get to work on the radio
controls," contradicted Jonner, get-
ting up. "That's something I can't
do, and I can get into a spacesuit
and haul a length of cable out to
the tug. Qoqol can handle the
winch."

DEVEET, THE Atom-Star
Company's representative at
Mars City, and Kruger of the Space
Control Commission were waiting
when the Radiant Hope's G-boat
dropped down from the Phobos sta-
tion and came to rest in a wash of
jets. They rode out to the G-boat
together in a Commission ground-
car. Jonner emerged from the G-
boat, following the handcuffed
Serj.

"He's all yours," Jonner told
Kruger, gesturing at Serj. "You
have my radio reports on the cable-
cutting, and I'll make my log avail-
able to you."

Kruger put his prisoner in the
front seat of the groundcar beside
him, and Jonner climbed in the
back seat with Deveet.

"I brought the crates of dies for
the groundcar factory down this
time," Jonner told Deveet. "We'll
bring down all the loose cargo be-
fore shooting the television cable
down. While they're unloading the
G-boat, I wish you'd get the tanks

CHARLES FONTENAY

refilled with hydrazine and nitric
acid. I've got enough to get back
up, but not enough for a round
trip."

"What do you plan to do?"
asked Deveet. He was a dark-
skinned, long-faced man with a
sardonic twist to his mouth.

"I've got to sign on a new ship's
doctor to replace Serj. When the
Marsward comes in, Marscorp will
have a dozen G-boats working
round the clock to unload and re-
load her. With only one G-boat,
we've got to make every hour
count. We still have reaction mass
to pick up on Phobos."

"Right," agreed Deveet. "You
can take the return cargo up in one
load, though. It's just twenty tons
of Martian relics for the Solar Mu-
seum. Mars-to-Earth cargos run
light."

At the administration building,
Jonner took his leave of Deveet and
went up to the Space Control Com-
mission's personnel office on the
second floor. He was in luck. On
the board as applying for a Mars-
Earth run as ship's doctor-psychol-
ogist was one name: Lana Elden.

He looked up the name in the
Mars City directory and dialed into
the city from a nearby telephone
booth. A woman's voice answered.

"Is Lana Elden there?" asked
Jonner.

"I'm Lana Elden," she said.

Jonner swore under his breath.
A woman ! But if she weren't quali-
fied, her name would not have been
on the Commission board.

The verbal contract was made
quickly, and Jonner cut the Com-
mission monitor into the line to

ATOM DRIVE

make it binding. That was done
often when rival ships, even of the
same line, were bidding for the
services of crewmen.

"Blastoff time is 2100 tonight,"
he said, ending the interview. "Be
here."

Jonner left the personnel office
and walked down the hall. At the
elevator, Deveet and Kruger hur-
ried out, almost colliding with him.

"Jonner, we've run into trouble!"
exclaimed Deveet. "Space Fuels
won't sell us any hydrazine and
nitric acid to refill the tanks. They
say they have a new contract with
Marscorp that takes all their sup-
ply."

"Contract, hell!" snorted Jon-
ner. "Marscorp owns Space Fuels.
What can be done about it, Kru-
ger?"

Kruger shook his head.

"I'm all for you, but Space Con-
trol has no jurisdiction," he said.
"If a private firm wants to restrict
its sales to a franchised line, there's
nothing we can do about it. If you
had a franchise, we could force
them to allot fuel on the basis of
cargo handled, since Space Fuels
has a monopoly here. But you don't
have a franchise yet."

Jonner scratched his grey head
thoughtfully.

It was a serious situation. The
atom-powered Radiant Hope could
no more make a planetary landing
than the chemically-powered ships.
Its power gave a low, sustained
thrust that permitted it to accel-
erate constantly over long periods
of time. To beat the powerful pull
of planetary surface gravity, the
terrific burst of quick energy from

65

the streamlined G-boats, the plane-
tary landing craft, was needed.

"We can still handle it," Jonner
said at last. "With only twenty tons
return cargo, we can take it up
this trip. Add some large para-
chutes to that, Deveet. We'll shoot
the end of the cable down by signal
rocket, out in the lowlands, and
stop the winch when we've made
contact, long enough to attach the
rest of the cargo to the cable. Pull
it down with the cable and, with
Mars' low gravity, the parachutes
will keep it from being damaged."

But when Jonner got back to the
landing field to check on unload-
ing operations, his plan was
smashed. As he approached the G-
boat, a mechanic wearing an ill-
concealed smirk came up to him.

"Captain, looks like you sprung
a leak in your fuel line," he said.
"All your hydrazine's leaked out in
the sand."

Jonner swung from the waist
and knocked the man flat. Then he
turned on his heel and went back
to the administration building to
pay the 10-credit fine he would be
assessed for assaulting a spaceport
employe.

The Space Control Commission's
hearing room in Mars City was al-
most empty. The examiner sat on
the bench, resting his chin on his
hand as he listened to testimony.
In the plaintiff's section sat Jonner,
flanked by Deveet and Lana Elden.
In the defense box were the Mars
Corporation attorney and Captain
Russo Baat of the Marsward
XV III. Kruger, seated near the
rear of the room, was the only

66

spectator.

The Mars Corporation attorney
had succeeded in delaying the final
hearing more than a 42-day Mar-
tian month by legal maneuvers.
Meanwhile, the Marsward XVIIl
had blasted down to Phobos, and
G-boats had been shuttling back
and forth unloading the vessel and
reloading it for the return trip to
Earth.

When testimony had been com-
pleted, the examiner shuffled
through his papers. He put on his
spectacles and peered over them at
the litigants.

"It is the ruling of this court,"
he said formally, "that the plain-
tiffs have not presented sufficient
evidence to prove tampering with
the fuel line of the G-boat of the
spaceship Radiant Hope. There is
no evidence that it was cut or
burned, but only that it was broken.
The court must remind the plain-
tiffs that this could have been done
accidentally, through inept hand-
ling of cargo.

"Since the plaintiffs have not
been able to prove their contention,
this court of complaint has no al-
ternative than to dismiss the case.

The examiner arose and left the
hearing room. Baat waddled across
the aisle, pufiing.

"Too bad, Jonner," he said. "I
don't like the stuff Marscorp's pull-
ing, and I think you know I don't
have anything to do with it.

"I want to win, but I want to
win fair and square. If there's any-
thing I can do to help . . ."

"Haven't got a spare G-boat in
your pocket, have you?" retorted
Jonner, with a rueful smile.

CHARLES FONTENAY

Baat pulled at his jowls.

"The Marsward isn't carrying
G-boats," he said regretfully. "They
all belong to the port, and Mars-
corp's got them so tied up you'll
never get a sniflf of one. But if you
want to get back to your ship, Jon-
ner, I can take you up to Phobos
with me, as my guest."

Jonner shook his head.

"I figure on taking the Radiant
Hope back to Earth," he said. "But
I'm not blasting off without cargo
until it's too late for me to beat
you on the run."

"You sure? This'll be my last
ferry trip. The Marsward blasts
off for Earth at 0300 tomorrow."

"No, thanks, Russo. But I will
appreciate your taking my ship's
doctor, Dr. Elden, up to Phobos."

"Done!" agreed Baat. "Let's go.
Dr. Elden. The G-boat leaves Mars-
port in two hours."

Jonner watched Baat puff away,
with the slender, white-clad bru-
nette at his side. Baat personally
would see Lana Elden safely aboard
the Radiant Hope, even if it de-
layed his own blastoff.

Morosely, he left the hearing
room with Deveet.

"What I can't understand," said
the latter, "is why all this dirty
work, why didn't Marscorp just use
one of their atom-drive ships for
the competition run?"'

"Because whatever ship is used
on a competition run has to be kept
in service on the franchised run,"
answered Jonner. "Marscorp has
millions tied up in hydrazine in-
terests, and they're more interested
in keeping an atomic ship off this
run than they are in a monopoly

ATOM DRIVE

franchise. But they tie in together:
if Marscorp loses the monopoly
franchise and Atom-Star puts in
atom-drive ships, Marscorp will
have to switch to atom-drive to
meet the competition."

"If we had a franchise, we could
force Space Fuels to sell us hydra-
zine," said Deveet unhappily.

"Well, we don't. And, at this
rate, we'll never get one."

JONNER AND Deveet were fish-
ing at the Mars City Recrea-
tion Center. It had been several
weeks since the Marsward XVIII
blasted off to Earth with a full
cargo. And still the atomic ship
Radiant Hope rested on Phobos
with most of her Marsbound cargo
still aboard; and still her crew
languished at the Phobos space
station; and still Jonner moved
back and forth between Mars City
and Marsport daily, racking his
brain for a solution that would not
come.

"How in space do you get twenty
tons of cargo up to an orbit 5,800
miles out, without any rocket fuel?"
he demanded of Deveet more than
once. He received no satisfactory
answer.

The Recreation Center was a
two-acre park that lay beneath the
plastic dome of Mars City. Above
them they could see swift-moving
Phobos and distant Deimos among
the other stars that powdered the
night. In the park around them,
colonists rode the amusement ma-
chines, canoed along the canal that
twisted through the park or sipped
refreshment at scattered tables. A

67

dozen or more satj like Jonner and
Deveet, around the edge of the tiny
lake, fishing.

Deveet's line tightened. He
pulled in a streamlined, flapping
object from which the light glis-
tened wetly.

"Good catch," complimented
Jonner. "That's worth a full cred-
it."

Deveet unhooked his catch and
laid it on the bank beside him. It
was a metal fish: live fish were un-
known on Mars. They paid for the
privilege of fishing for a certain
time and any fish caught were
"sold" back to the management at
a fixed price, depending on size, to
be put back into the lake.

"You're pretty good at it," said
Jonner. "That's your third tonight."

"It's all in the speed at which
you reel in your line," explained
Deveet. "The fish move at pre-set
speeds. They're made to turn and
catch a hook that moves across
their path at a slightly slower speed
than they're swimming. The man-
agement changes the speeds once a
week to keep the fishermen from
getting too expert."

"You can't beat the manage-
ment," chuckled Jonner. "But if it's
a matter of matching orbital speeds
to make contact, I ought to do
pretty well when I get the hang of
it."

He cocked an eye up toward the
transparent dome. Phobos had
moved across the sky into Capri-
corn since he last saw her. His
memory automatically ticked off
the satellite's orbital speed: 1.32
miles a second; speed in relation to
planetary motion . . .

68

Why go over that again? One
had to have fuel first. Meanwhile,
the Radiant Hope lay idle on
Phobos and its crew whiled away
the hours at the space station in-
side the moon, their feet spinning
faster than their heads . . . no, that
wasn't true on Phobos, because it
didn't have a spin to impart arti-
ficial gravity, like the space stations
around Earth.

He sat up suddenly. Deveet
looked at him in surprise. Jonner's
lips moved silently for a moment,
then he got to his feet.

"Where can we use a radio-
phone?" he asked.

"One in my office," said Deveet,
standing up.

"Let's go. Quick, before Phobos
sets."

They turned in their rods, Deveet
collecting the credits for his fish,
and left the Recreation Center.

When they reached the Atom-
Star Company's Martian office
Jonner plugged in the radiophone
and called the Phobos space sta-
tion. He got T'an.

"All of you get aboard," Jonner
ordered. "Then have Qoqol call
me."

He signed off and turned to
Deveet. Can we charter a plane to
haul our Earthbound cargo out of
Marsport?"

"A plane? I suppose so. Where
do you want to haul it?"

"Charax is as good as any other
place. But I need a fast plane."

"I think we can get it. Marscorp
still controls all the airlines, but the
Mars government keeps a pretty
strict finger on their planetbound
operations. They can't refuse a

CHARLES FONTENAY

cargo haul without good reason."
"Just to play safe, have some

friend of yours whom they don't

know, charter the plane in his

name. They won't know it's us till

we start loading cargo."

"Right," said Deveet, picking up

the telephone. "I know just the

man."

Towmotors scuttled across the
landing area at Marsport, shifting
the cargo that had been destined
for the Radiant Hope from the
helpless G-boat to a jet cargo-plane.
Nearby, watching the operation,
were Jonner and Deveet, with the
Marsport agent of Mars Air Trans-
port Company.

"We didn't know Atom-Star was
the one chartering the plane until
you ordered the G-boat cargo
loaded on it," confessed the Mars-
Air agent.

"I see you and Mr. Deveet are
signed up to accompany the cargo.
You'll have to rent suits for the
trip. We have to play it safe, and
there's always the possibility of a
forced landing."

"There are a couple of space-
suits aboard the G-boat that we
want to take along," said Jonner
casually. "We'll just wear those
instead."

"Okay." The agent spread his
hands and shrugged. "Everybody
at Marsport knows about you buck-
ing Marscorp, Captain. What you
expect to gain by transferring your
cargo to Charax is beyond me, but
it's your business."

An hour later, the chartered air-
plane took off with a thunder of
jets. Aboard was the 20-ton cargo

ATOM DRIVE

the Radiant Hope was supposed to
carry to Earth, plus some large
parachutes. The Mars-Air pilot
wore a light suit with plastic helmet
designed for survival in the thin,
cold Martian air. Jonner and De-
veet wore the bulkier spacesuits.

Five minutes out of Marsport,
Jonner thrust the muzzle of a heat-
gun in the pilot's back.

"Set it on automatic, strap on
your parachute and bail out," he
ordered. "We're taking over."

The pilot had no choice. He
went through the plane's airlock
and jumped, helped by a hearty
boost from Jonner. His parachute
blossomed out as he drifted down
toward the green Syrtis Major
Lowland. Jonner didn't worry
about him. He knew the pilot's
helmet radio would reach Mars-
port and a helicopter would rescue
him shortly.

"I don't know what you're try-
ing to do, Jonner," said Deveet ap-
prehensively over his spacehelmet
radio. "But whatever it is, you'd
better do it fast. They'll have every
plane on Mars looking for us in
half an hour."

"Let 'em look, and keep quiet a
while," retorted Jonner. "I've got
some figuring to do.

He put the plane on automatic,
took off the spacesuit handbooks
and scribbled figures on a scrap of
paper. He tuned in the plane's
radio and called Qogol on Phobos.
They talked to each other briefly
in Martian.

The darker green line of a canal
crossed the green lowland below
them.

"Good, there's Drosinas, mut-

69

tered Jonner. "Let's see, time 1424
hours, speed 660 miles an hour . . ."

Jonner boosted the jets a bit and
watched the terrain.

"By Saturn, I almost overran it!"
he exclaimed. "Deveet, smash out
those ports."

"Break out the ports?" repeated
Deveet. "That'll depressurize the
cabin!"

"That's right. So you'd better be
sure your spacesuit's secure."

Obviously puzzled, Deveet strode
up and down the cabin, knocking
out its six windows with the hand-
hooks of his spacesuit. Jonner
maneuvered the plane gently, and
set it on automatic. He got out of
the pilot's seat and strode to the
right front port.

Reaching through the broken
window, he pulled in a section of
cable that was trailing alongside.
While the baffled Deveet watched,
he reeled it in until he brought up
the end of it, to which was at-
tached a fish-shaped finned metal
missile.

Jonner carried the cable end and
the attached missile across the
cabin and tossed it out the broken
front port on the other side, swing-
ing it so that the 700-mile-an-hour
slipstream snapped it back in
through the rearmost port like a
bullet.

"Pick it up and pass it out the
right rear port," he commanded.
"We'll have to pass it to each other
from port to port. The slipstream
won't let us swing it forward and
through."

In a few moments, the two of
them had worked the missile and
the cable end to the right front

70

port and in through it. Originating
above the plane, it now made a
loop through the four open ports.
Jonner untied the missile and tied
the end to the portion which came
into the cabin, making a bowline
knot of the loop. Deveet picked up
the missile from the floor, where
Jonner had thrown it.

"Looks like a spent rocket shell,"
he commented.

"It's a signal rocket," said Jon-
ner. "The flare trigger was dis-
connected."

He picked up the microphone
and called the Radiant Hope on
Phobos.

"We've hooked our fish, Qoqol,"
he told the Martian, and laid the
mike aside.

"What does that mean?" asked
Deveet.

"Means we'd better strap in,"
said Jonner, suiting the action to
the words. "You're in for a short
trip to Phobos, Deveet."

Jonner pulled back slowly on the
elevator control, and the plane be-
gan a shallow climb. At 700 miles
an hour, it began to attain a height
at which its broad wings — broader
than those of any terrestrial plane
— would not support it.

"I'm trying to decide," said De-
veet with forced calm, "whether
you've flipped your helmet."

"Nope," answered Jonner.
"Trolling for those fish in Mars
City gave me the idea. The rest
was no more than an astrogation
problem, like any rendezvous with
a ship in a fixed orbit, which Qoqol
could figure. Remember that 6,000-
mile television cable the ship's haul-
ing? Qoqol just shot the end of it

CHARLES FONTENAY

down to Mars' surface by signal
rocket, we hooked on and now he'll
haul us up to Phobos. He's got the
ship's engine hooked onto the cable
winch."

The jets coughed and stopped.
The plane was out of fuel. It was
on momentum — to be drawn by
the cable, or to snap it and fall.

"Impossible!" cried Deveet in
alarm. "Phobos' orbital speed is
more than a mile a second! No
cable can take the sudden differ-
ence in that and the speed we're
traveling. When the slack is gone,
it'll break!"

"The slack's gone already. You're
thinking of the speed of Phobos, at
Phobos. At this end of the cable,
we're like the head of a man in the
control section of a space station,
which is traveling slower than his
feet because its orbit is smaller —
but it revolves around the center in
the same time.

"Look," Jonner added, "I'll put
it in round numbers. Figure your
cable as part of a radius of Phobos'
orbit. Phobos travels at 1.32, but
the other end of the radius travels
at zero because it's at the center.
The cable end, at the Martian sur-
face, travels at a speed in between
- — roughly 1,200 miles an hour —
but it keeps up with Phobos' revolu-
tion. Since the surface of Mars it-
self rotates at 500 miles an hour,
all I had to do was boost the plane
up to 700 to match the speed of the

cable end.

"That cable will haul a hell of a
lot more than twenty tons, and
that's all that's on it right now. By
winching us up slowly, there'll
never be too great a strain on it."

Deveet looked apprehensively out
of the port. The plane was hanging
sidewise now, and the distant Mar-
tian surface was straight out the
left-hand ports. The cable was
holding.

"We can make the trip to Earth
83 days faster than the Marsward,"
said Jonner, "and they have only
about 20 days' start. It won't take
us but a few days to make Phobos
and get this cable and the rest of
the cargo shot back to Mars. Atom-
Star will get its franchise, and
you'll see all spaceships switching
to the atomic drive within the next
decade."

"How about this plane?" asked
Deveet. "We stole it, you know."

"You can hire a G-boat to take
it back to Marsport," said Jonner
with a chuckle. "Pay Mars-Air for
the time and the broken ports, and
settle out of court with that pilot
we dropped. I don't think they'll
send you to jail, Deveet."

He was silent for a few minutes.

"By the way, Deveet," said Jon-
ner then, "radio Atom-Star to buy
some flonite cable of- their owr> and
ship it to Phobos. Damned if I
don't think this is cheaper than
G-boatsl" • • •

WHAT IS YOUR SCIENCE I.Q.?

ANSWERS: 1 — Silver. 2 — Cyclotron. 3— Rapidly. 4 — Blaise Pascal.
5— Electron. 6 — Catalysis. 7 — Inversely. 8 — 80. 9 — One. 10 — Partho-
genesis. 11—32. 12— Right angles. 13—14.7. 14— Violet. 15— Hydro-
gen. 16— One. 17— Two. 18— Hydrogen. 19— Balloons. 20— 5/9ths.

ATOM DRIVE

71

Il

c n r o oi e

A S T U M E

The Car was the new concept of the golden calf.

And the Green Pastures and Still Waters had

been replaced by the Happy Highways of Heaven . .

Object worship reached its heyday in the mid twenty-first
century. The bluebird, which had already become a number
of ignominious things, finally became an automobile. It grew
chrome wings and exchanged its heart for a carburetor, its
feet for wheels and its backyard for a pedestal in The Church
of the Happy Traveler. It was inevitable that the procedure
for catching it should change.

— Bethe Royale, MASS MOTIVATIONS

THE SENECA Cathedral was crowded even for Display
Sunday. Marcus Brett shouldered his way through the
vestibule into the big Showroom and paused at the head of
the center aisle. The Showroom was ablaze with the blue-
white radiance of fluorescent candles, a radiance brightly mul-

BY ROBERT F. YOUNG

tiplied by the mirrored walls, caught by the polished chrome
ceiling and flung blindingly down upon the congregation. The
new Seneca model which was to be unveiled stood upon the
pedestal behind the Dealer's dais, concealed by a huge damask
sheet. Brett looked at it hungrily, trying to visualize its new
lines, its new combination of colors. He took a slow deep
breath, then started down the aisle toward his reserved seat.
The seat next to his was Czech's, Brett's turn-buddy. Brett

Illustrated by Kelly Freas

73

was surprised to find it occupied by
a White Collar girl. White Collar
Workers were getting bolder and
bolder every day. Not that the
girl's boldness was going to do her
any good : as soon as Czech showed
up she'd have to leave.

She glanced at Brett curiously
when he sat down beside her and he
returned the glance with his flat
gray eyes. Her hair was short and
dark and her eyes were a limpid
brown. Her small turned up nose
and round cheeks lent her face a
quality of childish innocence; it
could almost have passed for a little
girl's face if her full lips hadn't
given it away. She was wearing a
cheap majorette ensemble, but
cheap or not, on her robust young
body it looked good.

Quite without his knowing it,
Brett's glance had become a stare.
The girl dropped her eyes, obvious-
ly embarrassed, though she did not
blush. Brett turned away then,
irked at the direction of his
thoughts, and tried to concentrate
on the sheet covered model.

It looked slightly longer than
last year's job, but he couldn't be
sure. However, an increase in
length was a good bet, for the
Seneca manufacturers had a tradi-
tion to live up to: every new model
they put on the market virtually
had to be longer than its predeces-
sor .. .

Gradually Brett became aware of
a subtle perfume. There was some-
thing about it — perhaps the nos-
talgic scent of apple blossoms which
it contained — that intrigued him.
There was no question as to its
source and it was all he could do to

74

keep his eyes on the sheet covered
model where they belonged. He
was relieved when the electronic
organ struck up the Seneca hymn
and the choir came down the aisle.
Brett listened to their voices with
usual dedication, but he still
smelled apple blossoms.

After the choir had aligned
themselves on either side of the
pedestal and delivered their last
note, the Dealer himself appeared,
resplendent in a gold and scarlet
robe. He walked slowly and majes-
tically down the aisle, stepped upon
the dais, and turned to face the
congregation. His eyes surveyed the
packed Showroom. "My children,"
he said simply, in his deep resonant
voice; then, after a brief prayer, he
began the Seneca beatitudes:

"Blessed are the rubber forests
of Vega Twelve for their worthy
contribution to the betterment of
Mankind. Blessed are the moun-
tains of Rigel Seven for their tin
and their copper and their mag-
nesium. . ." And finally — "Blessed
are the rust red plains of Alpha
Crucis Fourteen, for without their
manganese, their titanium, and
their iron ore, life as we know it
would have long since perished
from the Earth."

The sermon followed. It was a
typical sermon, exalting the su-
preme patience of the Finance
Bishop and deprecating the
thoughtless irresponsibility of the
average consumer. Brett shifted un-
easily. He had a guilty conscience.
During the caryear which was now
drawing to a close, he'd missed
three weekly installments and had
had to have them prorated. As a

ROBERT F. YOUNG

result, the remaining installments
had been so huge that he'd barely
been able to manage them, and
he'd come uncomfortably close to
losing his Seneca. Even now, with
his final payment safely deposited
with the Finance Bishop, the very
thought of such a calamity was
enough to evoke tiny globules of
sweat on his brow.

He promised himself to be more
conservative in the future, chase
fewer women, drink fewer Dream
Girls. Then his attention wandered.
The Dealer was explaining a new
decree which the Finance Bishop
had issued, and decrees bored Brett
to death. He unsealed his white
driving jacket and slumped down
in his seat, crossing his booted legs.
The apple blossom scent was all
around him, more intriguing than
ever. He wondered rather desper-
ately what had happened to Czech
and concluded that something im-
portant must have come up and
made it impossible for him to at-
tend the services.

At last the sermon ended and the
moment for the unveiling arrived.
The congregation murmured in
awed expectation, and there was
an over-all shift in the spectrum of
gaudy driving jackets as everyone
leaned forward in his seat. After
giving forth with the usual pane-
gyrics concerning the superiority of
Seneca models in general and the
new Seneca model in particular, the
Dealer said: "And now it is my
privilege to reveal our latest crea-
tive masterpiece — the Bluebird!"

He raised one square bejeweled
hand and the sheet fluttered ceil-
ingward like a frightened cloud. At

CHROME PASTURES

first there was only silence, and
then a mass Ahhhh rose from
the congregation. Following the
Ahhhh, voice after voice was raised
in reverent astonishment.

"Why," Brett gasped, "it if
longer, A good ten inches longer!"

"It's a dream," the White Col-
lar girl breathed.

"Beautiful," Brett murmured.
"Beautiful beautiful beautiful . . ."

He began to notice some of the
details he had glossed over in his
first moment of rapture. The Blue-
bird was not only longer than last
year's model, it was lower, too: its
highest point was barely three feet
above the pedestal. And there was
a striking change in the chrome
decor, the main feature being a
wing-like strip along the brilliant
blue flanks so suggestive of move-
ment that it was hard to believe
the car was standing still.

"It looks almost as if it could
fly," the White Collar girl said.

In his excitement, Brett forgot
her status. "It's a swell job all
right," he said, turning towards her.

"Such a beautiful blue!"

Briefly, Brett forgot the car. The
girl's enthusiasm had turned her
full cheeks pink, made her dark
eyes sparkle. Her cheap majorette
ensemble was painfully conspicious
in a gathering where women wore
feminine adaptations of masculine
driving attire; nevertheless, it
brought out her figure in a way
that a pair of thigh-tight breeches
and a breast-fitted jacket never
could have. Abruptly Brett won-
dered what she'd be like undressed.
He'd never tried to pick up a
White Collar girl, not only because

75

they were beneath his social status,
but because it had never occurred
to him that any of them would be
worth the trouble.

This one looked like she might be
worth a lot of trouble. "What's
your name?" he asked impulsively,
invisible apple blossoms falling aJl
around him.

"Linda," she said. "Linda
Dalms."

"Mark Brett. . . Like to ride?"

Her eyes had been on his face.
At his question they dropped to the
gaudy Seneca insigne on the collar
of his jacket. "Yes, Yes I do."

"How would it be if I picked
you up around six tonight and we
take a whirl?"

"It would be divine," Linda
said . . .

The Dealer was bringing the
services to a close. "Tonight," he
said, "the Bluebird will be placed
on display in Seneca Square. While
there will be enough of the new
models to supply all our customers,
I'd advise all prospective buyers to
place their orders before Turn- In
Friday in order to be assured of
delivery by New Car Sunday. Or-
ders will be taken in the vicarage
immediately following the end of
the services."

After the prayer, Brett accom-
panied Linda to the street. Stand-
ing in the April morning sunlight,
he said: "Guess I'll order mine
right away. No sense waiting."

He watched for a gleam of envy
to come into her eyes; such a reac-
tion on the part of a person who
couldn't even buy one of the
chrome wings of the new model
would have been logical. But Lin-

76

da's eyes remained the same-
large and limpid and guileless —
and all she said was, "I'm glad,
Mr. Brett."

Brett was annoyed. "Where-
abouts in Center City do you live?"
he asked abruptly.

She hadn't said she lived in Cen-
ter City and his assuming that she
did was a calculated insult, even
though both of them knew she
couldn't possibly live anywhere else.
But if the insult got home, she gave
no sign. "The old office block," she
said. "Building 14, Apartment
902."

"I'll see you about six," Brett
said. He was about to turn and
walk away, but she beat him to it.
She threw a soft goodbye over her
shoulder just before the departing
crowd engulfed her. He stood there
furious for a moment, but a wisp of
her perfume had lingered behind
her and when it touched his nos-
trils his anger dissolved.

Suddenly he remembered the
small apple orchard in which he
had played as a little boy. The
whole scene came back, the trees
with their pink-white blossoms, his
mother reading in the nearby sum-
merhouse ; the utter peace and tran-
quillity that had pervaded the love-
ly June day. . . The orchard was
gone now, leveled to make room
for the new illuminated Raceway,
the orchard and the antique double
garage behind which it had stood;
and his mother too, for that matter,
killed in the same five car pile-up
in which his father had perished
magnificently. Only the memory re-
mained, strengthened by the num-
ber of times he had had to recall it

ROBERT F. YOUNG

orally in the presence of the finance
psychoanalyst during the yearly
pre-contract examination, and trig-
gered now by the ersatz scent of
apple blossoms contained in a
White Collar girl's perfume.

It was far from being an un-
pleasant memory, and ordinarily
Brett would have permitted his
mind to dwell upon it. But there
was a much more important item
on his mind this morning and the
memory had scarcely touched his
consciousness before the Bluebird
brushed it aside with a scintillating
flurry of chrome wings. Brett turned
and began walking towards the
vicarage.

The Seneca vicarage adjoined
the Seneca cathedral, facing the
mile-wide business boulevard that
encircled Center City. While its
modest fagade could not compete
with the glorious facade of the
cathedral itself, it was imposing in
its own right. It had no chrome-
mullioned windows of course, and
no chrome-garnished steeples; but
its ornamental glassbrick design
was pleasing to the eye, and it
boasted the largest display window
of any vicarage in the city.

Last year's Seneca- — the Four
Million model — still stood in the
window. Brett merely glanced at it
as he passed. A year ago its sleek
lines and scarlet body had dazzled
him, and he had been one of the
thousands of enthusiastic First
Owners to drive in the New Car
Sunday Parade. But now he had
glimpsed the Bluebird and beside
the Bluebird the Four Million
looked like an antique clunker, only

CHROME PASTURES

too deserving of the fiery demise
which awaited it in one of the
open hearths during the coming
caryear.

A queue of people had formed
outside the vicarage door and Brett
appended himself to it. He lit a
cigarette and smoked nervously. It
was noon by the time he stood in
front of the caged window and pre-
sented his identity disk to the aco-
lyte in charge.

The acolyte took the disk and
placed it beneath the objective eye
of the electronic examiner. Brett
waited complacently for the famil-
iar "Beep" of approval. He was
demoralized when the examiner
emitted the raucous buzz that sig-
nified credit disqualification.

"There must be some mistake,",
he said tightly. "Try it again."

The acolyte did so. The buzz
sounded again, more raucous than
before. "There's no mistake," the
acolyte said.

"But there must be!" Brett's
whole world was tottering. "I want
to see the Dealer. I demand to see
the Dealer!"

"If you wish." The acolyte de-
pressed a button with his elbow.
"Another one. Father," he said in-
to his wristcom, giving Brett's name
and number. Then he raised his
wrist to his ear, listened a moment,
finally lowered his arm and de-
pressed the elbow switch again. The
Dealer will see you presently," he
said to Brett, handing back the
disk. "Take a seat, please."

There was a bench running the
length of the office at right angles
to the acolyte's window. Brett saw
that it was already crowded, and he

77

felt some consolation in the evident
fact that his disk wasn't the only
one that the examiner had rejected.
He made room for himself, wedg-
ing his lean body between a per-
spiring fat man and a sniffling wom-
an; then he folded his arms across
his chest and gazed up through the
transparent ceiling into the pale
blue April sky.

A jet had just finished strato-
sphere-writing. Brett read the
familiar sentence automatically :
THE FINANCE MAN WILL
GET YOU IF YOU DON'T
WATCH OUT! He winced and
dropped his eyes to the tile floor.
The Finance Man had been close
upon his heels for the past several
months and the experience had
been harrowing. And then the
thought struck him: perhaps his
three defaulted payments had had
something to do with his credit dis-
qualification.

He shook his head. Missing pay-
ments and prorating them was
common practice, and becoming
more common every day. It was
unthinkable that the Finance Bish-
op would disqualify anyone's credit
on those grounds alone.

Or was it?

Brett spent the next two hours
trying to convince himself that it
was. Every fifteen minutes or so a
small, tousle-haired acolyte threw
open the door leading to the Deal-
er's quarters, called a name, and
one of the occupants of the bench
got up and followed him out of the
office. But the bench never emptied.
At intervals the examiner behind
the acolyte's window would emit a
raucous buzz, and shortly there-

78

after another crestfallen consumer
would come over and sit down.

Presently the tousle-haired aco-
lyte opened the door and said:
"Marcus Brett." Brett got up, fol-
lowed him through a long cool
corridor, through two sumptuous
outer rooms and into a large study.
Three of the study walls were lined
with car catalogues, parts manuals,
and road atlases — all bound in imi-
tation Morocco leather. On the
wall opposite the door hung a huge
three-dimensional mural depicting
the popular conception of the High-
ways of Heaven: shining roads
leaped like shards of light from
fleecy cloud to fleecy cloud against
a backdrop of breathless blue, and
here and there along the promised
highways could be seen the speed-
ing cars of the Happy Travelers.

The Dealer sat behind a tremen-
dous chrome desk studying a thick
sheaf of papers. He had divested
himself of his sacerdotal robes and
was wearing a black, smartly-cut
driving jacket that contrasted eff'ec-
tively with the whiteness of his
turned around collar. He looked
up when Brett and the acolyte en-
tered, dismissing the acolyte with a
wriggle of his little finger. "Sit
down, my son," he said to Brett,
indicating a chrome chair by the
desk.

Brett complied nervously and the
Dealer returned his attention to the
papers. He was an old man — forty-
five at least. But that was not sur-
prising for Dealers were usually
good drivers. The ancient tortoise-
rimmed spectacles which he affect-
ed gave his full square face an aris-
tocratic touch, and his dark brown

ROBERT F. YOUNG

hair grew gray and graceful along
his temples.

After a moment he looked up at
Brett again. "You realize, do you
not," he said in his deep pleasant
voice, "that these papers which I
am perusing are facsimiles of your
contract, your promptitude record,
your character analysis, and your
biography?"

"Yes, Father."

"An electronic examiner never
makes a mistake, but I am always
willing to check and recheck a cus-
tomer's dossier if he so wishes. I
have checked yours thoroughly and
see nothing that would invalidate
the examiner's decision. What
makes you think that your credit
does not deserve disqualification?"

"I can't see any reason why it
should deserve disqualification,"
Brett said hoarsely. "My Four Mil-
lion's all paid for— I deposited my
last installment in the Finance Bish-
op's account yesterday. Maybe I
defaulted once or twice, but—"

"Three times," the Dealer said.
. . "Did you attend my services this
morning?"

"Certainly, Father. I attend your
services every Sunday."

The Dealer shook his large hand-
some head in mild despair. "You at-
tend them — and hear nothing of
what I say. This morning I called
everyone's attention to the new
restriction which the Finance Bish-
op has seen fit to impose on future
finance contractions, yet apparent-
ly no one in the Showroom heard
me other than myself."

Brett hung his head. "I heard
you mention something about a
restriction, but I'm afraid I missed

CHROME PASTURES

exactly what it was."

"I'll repeat verbatim what I
said." The Dealer leaned forward,
resting his elbows on the polished
chrome of the desktop. "Listen
carefully, my son: In view of the
fact that delinquency in weekly
finance payments has increased de-
plorably during the recent caryear,
the Finance Bishop has been forced
to issue the following decree: 'Any
car buyer who has defaulted on
more than two installments during
the caryear ending April 6, 2055
shall be deemed unworthy of con-
tract renewal on any new model
unless ( 1 ) he deposits a down pay-
ment in addition to the traditional
one third allowance on his last
year's model, said payment not to
be less than one fourth the amount
of the remaining balance, or (2) he
submits evidence that his character
has, or will in the near future, come
under the stabilizing influence of a
factor hitherto unpresent.' "

Brett was on his feet. His face
was ashen. "But that's fantastic,
Father!" he shouted. "You know I
can't raise that much money!"

The Dealer raised a square,
twinkling hand. "Calm yourself, my
son. If alternative number one is
impracticable, why not consider al-
ternative number two? And in this
connection, may I presume to elab-
orate upon the Finance Bishop's
erudite, but somewhat confusing,
phraseology? The factor to which
His Holiness refers is, to put it
simply, marriage. It is a statistical
fact that of all the car buyers who
defaulted on more than two pay-
ments during the recent caryear,
ninety-eight percent were unat-

79

tached men or women, the men
predominating by a ratio of almost
two to one. Quite obviously the re-
sponsibilities of conjugality have a
stabilizing effect upon both sexes,
particularly the male; add to this
happy eventuality the fact that
marriage brings two incomes to-
gether over the same garage and
you begin to appreciate the shrewd
reasoning behind the Bishop's de-
cree . . . Have you any marital pros-
pects, my son?"

Brett shook his head numbly. His
last affair had been dead embers
for more than a week, and the one
coming up with the White Collar
girl didn't count. A White Collar
girl was a far cry from being a
marital prospect.

"Then I'd suggest," the Dealer
continued, "that you start looking
around. And may I remind you,"
he added, his wide, thin-lipped
mouth curving in a bleak smile,
"that you haven't much time if you
don't want to get caught without a
new car. You have, in fact — "and
he glanced at his watch — "six days,
nine hours, forty minutes, and some
odd seconds before New Car Sun-
Day."

He wriggled his little finger and
the tousle-haired acolyte appeared
magically in the doorway. "Show
Consumer Brett out through the
side entrance," the Dealer said.
"And for Seneca's sake, comb your
hair!"

BRETT HEADED straight for
the parklot. He was so upset
that he almost climbed into his
Seneca without deactivating the

80

sentry and he came close to getting
his brains blown out for trying to
steal his own car.

The sentry was the latest car
thief device to be put on the mar-
ket, and like all the devices that
had preceded it, it would be good
only until the car thieves got onto
it. Otherwise its only drawback
was its impartiality: while it was
functioning anyone who came with-
in its field of vision was automatic-
ally classified as a car thief and
shortly thereafter became a car
thief with a hole in his head.

Driving along the boulevard,
Brett considered getting rid of the
deadly little mechanism. He decid-
ed not to. The safety of his Seneca
warranted a little personal danger.
After all, it was the only car he
had, and from the way things were
beginning to look, it was the last
car he was ever going to have.

He made a complete circuit of
the business district, his mind re-
verting to the Bluebird. He had
never wanted a car so badly. Pre-
sently he turned down one of the
tangent streets that led to Periph-
eral City. After the mile-wide bou-
levard. Peripheral City seemed
friendly and secure. Brett drove
along slowly, winding through the
idyllic streets, looking at the
trimmed hedges and the pruned
shade trees, the neat garages set
well back from the street and
reached by concrete, blacktop, peb-
ble, or gravel driveways; the charm-
ing little self-service stations tucked
away in maple arbors.

Garages always fascinated him,
regardless of his mood. There was
that colonial affair, with sedate

ROBERT F. YOUNG

hedgerows leading up to its early
American double doors; and then,
a block farther on, that ranch type
affair, so low and rambling that
there was hardly enough space for
the overhead apartment. Double
garages predominated of course;
one car families were unusual in
Peripheral City, and a single garage
almost invariably implied a single
man or woman.

Presently he came to the street
that led to his own garage and
turned down it. His problem was
heavy on his shoulders as he
climbed the narrow stairs to his
overhead apartment, and when he
bumped his head on the low beam
in the kitchenette, his morale was
far from being improved.

He ordered a salmon course from
the Instantcook, and picked at it
disinterestedly when it emerged.
For one of the few times in his life
he couldn't concentrate on his
food. All he could think of was the
Bluebird.

He glanced at his watch. He had
nearly two hours to kill before he
could pick up Linda. He decided
against going for a ride — riding
would only bring the Bluebird more
poignantly to mind. That left 3V.
Brett threw the remnants of his
meal into the devourer and went
into the compact living room. He
sat down in his relaxer and toed on
the 3V set. The Construction En-
gineer materialized on the screen.

Ordinarily Brett never listened
to the Construction Engineer.
Changing channels when the thin
haunted face appeared was prac-
tically a conditioned reflex in any
car owner. But Brett wasn't himself

CHROME PASTURES

today, and he lay back in his re-
laxer, hardly aware of what the
man was saying.

However, his indifference was
short-lived. There was a quality
about the Construction Engineer's
voice that commanded attention: a
deep, vibrant sincerity that belied
the insanity of his perspective, the
dearth of logic behind his words.

His words were many —

" — cannot impart sanctity. Steal-
ing the hierarchical nomenclature,
the architectonics, and the cere-
monial garb from a genuine in-
stitution and integrating them into
a pseudo-institution can never val-
idate that pseudo-institution in the
eyes of God. A money lender is
still a money lender no matter
what title he confers upon himself.
Spires do not a cathedral make, nor
sacerdotal robes a man of God.

"Economic necessity can never
justify the apotheosis of metal. The
fact that the yearly turnover of
automobiles is inexorably related to
the financial security of the in-
dividual is an inadequate founda-
tion for a religion. I say to you:
Better an economic chaos than the
idealogical chaos which affronts us
now!"

Brett shifted uncomfortably in
the relaxer. What the Construction
Engineer was saying was pure non-
sense, but his sincerity was to un-
questionable that the nonsense
took on some of the aspects of
sense.

Perhaps that was why the Deal-
ers feared him so much, why they
campaigned so incessantly against
him. The Seneca Dealer was the
most zealous campaigner, possibly

81

because it was the Seneca Memo-
rial Trust Building that had pre-
cipitated the Construction En-
gineer's heresy. A year ago his bid
had been accepted by the Seneca
Foundation and he had begun the
job on schedule. Then, the day fol-
lowing the ceremonial laying of the
first cornerstone, he had inexplic-
ably disappeared. All efforts to con-
tact him had failed, and finally
another contractor had been en-
gaged. Then, six months later, the
Construction Engineer had reap-
peared, purchased 3V time, and
commenced his series of anti-auto-
mobile lectures.

To date, the Dealers had been
unable to do much about him.
Even the Finance Bishop was help-
less. For although the Construction
Engineer's lectures sometimes em-
bodied economic and ethical here-
sy, he had never advocated the
overthrow of the existent society on
any but a religious level and there-
fore could not be prosecuted.

With an effort Brett raised his
eyes to the man's face. It was an
old face — the Construction En-
gineer was a good fifty. But con-
sidering the fact that he had not
driven a car for years, his age was
not unusual. In spite of himself
Brett found himself listening to the
man's words:

"The canonization in the year
1970 of the original automobile
manufacturers was the result of
diverse pressures: the whole econ-
omy hinged on car output and car
consumption ; the four-wheeled
raison d'etre of the average in-
dividual had long ago been estab-
lished ; and the automobile f oun-

82

dations had already begun the
initial experiments in faster-than-
light drives that led eventually to
the conquest of interstellar space —
and of course to the acquisition of
desperately needed natural re-
sources.

"But the canonization of the
original automobile manufacturers
can never justify the series of sacri-
legious events that followed it: the
new sales methods, the renaming of
names, the rebuilding of showrooms
to resemble cathedrals, the creation
of the Church of the Happy Trav-
eler and its subsequent usurpation
of all religious activities in the
western world; the supplanting of
Green Pastures and Still Waters
with the immature concept of the
Highways of Heaven — "

The Construction Engineer
paused, as though overcome by his
own rhetoric. "What," he asked ab-
ruptly, "is a car?" There was a
blackboard behind him and, turn-
ing, he printed the letter "A" in
the upper left hand corner and the
letter "B" in the lower right hand
corner.

"A car," he went on, "is a me-
chanical conveyance capable of
transporting us from point "A" to
point "B", or, conversely, from
point "B" to point "A". It is noth-
ing more than that.

"It is a means toward an end,
and as long as it is so regarded, it
is beneficial to the human race.
When, however, it is regarded as
an end in itself, nothing but tragedy
can result — "

With a convulsive movement
Brett pressed the channel pedal
with the toe of his right boot. The

ROBERT F. YOUNG

Construction Engineer was begin-
ning to get on his nerves.

He looked at his watch: 5:00
o'clock. If he stopped some place
and had a few drinks he could be
at Linda's apartment long enough
after six to convince her that he
didn't much care whether she went
riding with him or not.

He descended to the garage, de-
activated the sentry and got in his
Seneca. He chose a tangent street
at random, made a half circle of
the business boulevard and drew
into the parklot of the The Hub
Cap. It was dusk by then and the
myriad lights of the business build-
ings formed coruscating palisades
on either side of the car streaming
boulevard.

Brett brooded over a Dream
Girl at the chrome bar, trying to
see some way out of his dilemma.
He lit a cigarette and considered
selling his garage to raise the one
fourth down payment which the
Finance Bishop required. But if he
sold his garage he'd have to live in
his car, and it would only be a
question of time before the carcops
picked him up for Indecency. Next
he considered putting a second
mortgage on his garage. But that
would never do: he had trouble
enough keeping up the payments
on the first mortgage.

Finally, after three more Dream
Girls, he got around to consider-
ing marriage. He didn't consider
it for long. Marriage, when you
were only twenty-six, was an out-
rageous price to have to pay, even
for a Bluebird. Besides, he had
no prospects anyway — unless you
counted Linda.

CHROME PASTURES

And he was damned if he'd
count her!

But just the same, when he
thought of her his pulse came to
life, and he glanced at the clock
inset in the big chrome hub cap
behind the bar: 5:57. He finished
his fifth Dream Girl hurriedly and
went out and got in his Seneca. It
wasn't technically wise to be too
late.

Center City had once been the
city before the gradual exodus to
the suburbs had isolated it. Some
of its buildings were centuries old,
and its ancient streets were little
more than series of chuck holes,
frost upheavals, and fissures.

A long time ago the begrimed
towers had been honeycombed with
offices; now the few offices needed
in a society of business machines
existed behind the bright fagades
on the business boulevard, while
the old office space had been taken
over by the White Collar Workers
and converted into apartments.

The elevator of Building 14
creaked alarmingly as it raised him
to the ninth floor. He was relieved
when he stepped out into the clut-
tered corridor. Old fashioned fluo-
rescents cast pallid light on the
dusty floor, lent a ghastly tinge to
the peeling walls. Many of the
rooms were vacant, but most of
them were occupied by squabbling
families. The stale odor of plank-
ton soup hung in the air like mias-
ma.

By the time he found Apartment
12, Brett was sorry he had come.
Then, when the battered door
opened at his knock and Linda

83

stepped out to meet him, he was
suddenly glad that he had come.
The odor of plankton soup faded
away and the corridor became an
apple orchard in June. Linda had
exchanged the majorette ensemble
for a simple dacron dress, and she
looked like a Greek goddess with a
baby face who had just descended
the slopes of Olympus to find out
what mortal life was all about.

Brett took a slow, deep breath,
"All set, baby?" he said.

When Brett was a small boy at-
tending elementary tech, there had
been a certain period which he and
all the other pupils looked forward
to each day. It was the period dur-
ing which the identifilms— donated
by the Seneca, the Oneida, or one
of the other Dealers — were shown,
and it was called the Daydream
Hour.

Invariably the identifilms dealt
with automobiles, and invariably
the youthful audience got a chance
to get behind the wheel at least
once during the hour. Total iden-
tification techniques were primitive
in those days, but they were capable
of lending a sense of participation,
especially if you were a child.

The film that had made the
deepest impression on Brett depic-
ted a boy taking his girl for a ride
in a new Seneca. The boy was
Brett's own age and Brett iden-
tified with him easily, and shortly
he was behind the wheel and feel-
ing the pulse of the car beneath his
feet and the summer wind in his
hair. From that moment on, he had
lived for the time when he could
really climb into a new Seneca and

84

really take his girl for a ride on the
Speedway.

He had realized the Daydream
many times by now of course,
though the Speedway had bowed
out before the wider and better
banked Raceway; but those first
vicarious moments were still sweet
in his memory, and he knew he
would never forget them as long as
he lived.

"Do you always drive so fast?"
Linda asked.

"You call this fast?" Brett said.
"You should ride to work with me
some time!"

The illuminated Raceway had its
usual Sunday evening complement
of hurtling cars. Brett twisted a-
droitly in and out, never diminish-
ing the Seneca's speed unless col-
lision were unavoidable. The
myriad lights of the Seneca As-
sembly Plant began to flicker by.
Brett pointed.

"That's where they put these
jobs together," he said.

"Do you work there?"

"Not me. I run an open hearth."

"Oh."

It was a small "oh." And small
wonder, Brett thought. The kid
was probably overawed. Here was
a world she had probably never
seen before, imprisoned as she was
in the cramped canyons of Center
City.

The lights of the Seneca Stamp-
ing Plant came next, and after
them, the haze-dimmed lights of
the Seneca Steel Mill. Brett point-
ed out the open hearth which he
operated, but it was behind them
by the time Linda turned her head.

ROBERT F. YOUNG

"Ever seen the spaceport?" he
asked.

"Not for years."

"I know a parking place where
we can get a good view of the
ships. "What d'you say?"

"All right," Linda said.

Brett watched for the tumoff,
and when it appeared, slipped
smoothly out of the stream of traf-
fic. The darkness of the country-
side activated the Seneca's head-
lights, and the macadam leaped
into bright visibility. It was familiar
territory to Brett and he drove con-
fidently, taking the banked curves
at an easy ninety. It was the kind
of driving he liked best.

The spires of the ships began to
show against the starred sky. Brett
slowed the Seneca, keeping an eye
on the right shoulder of the mac-
adam. Presently the sign he was
looking for appeared: SKULL
HILL ROAD. PROCEED AT
YOUR OWN RISK.

It was a dirt road, badly eroded
by the spring rains. He followed it
to the crest of the hill from which
it had obtained its name, then
turned off into a blackened field.
The hill had been halved to make
room for the expanding port, and
he braked the Seneca near the edge
of the man-made cliff. There was a
ship squatting in the blasting pit
at the foot of the cliff, its tapered
prow rising high above the halved
hilltop. Beyond it, the prows of
other ships showed, some in dark-
ness, some pied with the round
radiance of open ports.

Brett turned off the motor and
extinguished the headlights. He
turned to Linda. "Like it here?"

CHROME PASTURES

"Is it safe? That sign back
there — "

"That sign is for rubes who don't
know anything about ship sched-
ules," Brett said. "That big job in
the pit there is the only one close
enough to bum us and it isn't due
to blast off till Turn-In Friday. It's
a prison ship."

"If it did blast right now, there
wouldn't be much left of us, would
there, Mark?" she said.

"Not even ashes. But I didn't
bring you all the way up here just
to talk about ships." He slipped his
arm around her shoulders.

She moved closer to him. Her
face, when he bent down to kiss
her, was soft and pale in the star-
light; her lips were tender, cool
and moist. Apple blossoms fell
aromatically and April changed
subtly to June. A sense of security
pervaded Brett; he felt safe and
warm and wanted. , . .

His hand fumbled with the shoul-
der strap of the dacron dress, then
paused of its own accord. He tried
again, and again his hand refused
to do his bidding.

He raised his head and looked
down into Linda's round starlit
face. Her eyes seemed more limpid
than ever, and from their deeps
the reflected stars looked steadily
up at him. Tenderness suffused
him, tenderness and anger. For
with the tenderness came the real-
ization that he could not treat this
girl the way he had treated all the
others.

His need for her was different; it
was far more complex than the sim-
ple craving he'd experienced in the
presence of the other girls he had

85

taken out. He could not analyze it
— it was far beyond him ; and final-
ly he gave up trying.

He bent and kissed her again and
contentment and peace engulfed
him. He became a wanderer in the
enchanted universe of her lips and
her subtle perfume. When he raised
his head and looked around him
the night had attained a new beau-
ty: a simple beauty of land and
sky and stars.

He knew that if he kissed her
again he would say things he would
regret in the morning, and he
knew that if they stayed there on
the hilltop he could not help kiss-
ing her again. Brett was a practical
man. He kneed the starter and the
Seneca purred in the night, its
headlights picking up the pitted
hull of the prison ship.

He withdrew his arm from Lin-
da's shoulder. "Feel like riding?"
he asked.

Her limpid eyes regarded him
quietly, and again he saw the re-
flected stars in their depths. The
laughing stars — For a moment he
had the eerie feeling that she knew
exactly what he was thinking, ex-
actly why he was running away.

But she only said: "I love to
ride."

BRETT WENT to bed thinking
about Linda and he got up the
next morning and went to work
still thinking about Linda. Her
face accompanied him up to the
air-conditioned control booth and
her eyes mocked him as he sat
down before the televised images of
his six furnaces, numbers 40

86

through 45.

"40's ready," the 0400-0800 man
said, donning his jacket. "I just
took a test bar . . . How's the car?"

"Fine," Brett said. "How's
yours?"

"Couldn't be better. Be seeing
you."

Brett lit a cigarette and blew
smoke into Linda's face. Then he
tapped 40, giving his attention to
the pit screen while the blue-white
heat poured out into the three hun-
dred ton ladle. His fingers moving
unen'ingly over the intricate maze
of buttons on the horizontal remote
control panel. He started number
2 charger on the limestone charge.
The scrap charge was late and he
phoned Yard to hurry it up.

Pit called, "45 be ready this
turn?" Czech asked.

Brett glanced at the tapping time
schedule. "No."

"That's good news," Czech said
. . . "How's the Seneca?"

"Fine," Brett said. "How's
yours?"

"Great."

Brett thought of something.
"Where were you yesterday? I
didn't see you at the Services."

"I got called before the Finance
Bishop," Czech said. "Somehow
they forgot to process my last ten
payments and the F. B. thought I'd
defaulted. But when I kept insist-
ing that I was paid up to date, he
checked back and found out that
his office was to blame. Some effi-
ciency! How was the Bluebird?"

"Out of this world," Brett said.

"Going to get one?"

"Certainly I'm going to get one!
Why should you ask that?"

ROBERT F. YOUNG

"Don't get mad. I was just curi-
ous."

"I'm not mad!"

Brett hung up. His hands were
trembling. Linda had driven the
Bluebird out of his thoughts, but
now it flew back, more tantalizing
than before. If he continued to
drive his Four Million model after
Turn-In Friday, he would auto-
matically become a social outcast.
There was no law that said you had
to turn your car in every year. But
there were the expressions on peo-
ples' faces and there was the con-
tempt in peoples' eyes; there was
the hollow feeling inside you that
you did not belong; that you were
no better than the White Collar
Workers who walked all their lives
because their wages never permit-
ted them to amass the amount of a
down payment.

Abruptly his thoughts switched
back to Linda. Why should a pover-
ty-stricken White Collar girl aflfect
him so? What quality did she have
that his other girls had lacked? He
did not know. He only knew that
he had to see her again, that the
security and contentment he had
experienced in her company had
only whetted his appetite.

Yard had sent up the scrap
charge, and Brett started number
2 charger in on the first buggy. He
never tired of watching a scrap
charge. He loved to see the com-
pressed bodies of last year's cars
being shoved into the White-hot
maw of the hearth, dumped un-
ceremoniously, then left to turn
into unshapely pink ghosts, finally
to dissolve into the yellow ignominy
of molten metal.

CHROME PASTURES

Soon, he knew, he would be get-
ting the first of the Four Million
bodies. And none to soon. Last
year's scrap inventory was nearly
exhausted and the open hearths
needed new material.

In his absorption with the scrap
charge Brett had forgotten Linda
and the Bluebird, but the moment
the charger dumped the last pan,
both returned to haunt him. For
the first time he saw Linda and the
Bluebird in relationship to each
other, and a common solution to
both problems began to germinate
in his mind.

It was time for 43 's drink and
Brett brought the hot metal ladle
down on number 1 crane, set the
spout in number 3 door, and slowly
tilted the ladle till the red-gold
Crucis ore spilled in a steady mol-
ten flow down into the bath.

His mind was exceedingly clear
now. There were two main objec-
tives: (1) to get the Bluebird, (2)
to have his way with Linda. Get-
ting the Bluebird involved getting
married; having his way with Lin-
da, and placating his incompre-
hensible idealization of her, in-
volved the same thing. But there
was one more consideration: his
self respect.

Steel workers in their right minds
did not marry White Collar girls.
Not if they wanted to keep their
self respect. But a steel worker
could marry a White Collar girl
and keep his self respect if he had
the marriage annulled as soon as he
got what he wanted. And getting
the annulment would be no prob-
lem: no judge could possibly fail
to see the incongruity of such a

87

union once it was brought to his
attention.

Rehef ran warmly through
Brett's body. Here was the perfect
solution; here was the loophole
which the Finance Bishop had
overlooked. Not only would he be
able to get the Bluebird, but he
would be able to make love to
Linda without coming into conflict
with his idiotic idealization of her;
and he would emerge from the
whole transaction a free man.

It was time for 44's drink. Brett
whistled happily as he guided num-
ber 1 crane down the floor to the
hot metal pit. The world had never
seemed so bright.

After the turn he shaved and
showered, then he dressed and went
down to the open hearth parklot.
He deactivated the sentry, then he
started the Seneca and drove it out
of the lot and onto the Raceway.
He gunned it up to one ten. The
April wind sang in the vents, and
the sky was a brisk spring blue.

He stopped at a Raceway res-
taurant and ordered a scallop plate.
There was a 3V screen behind the
counter and a tele-newscast was in
progress. The Construction En-
gineer was the number one topic
of the day; according to the an-
nouncer he had gone berserk on the
previous night and left himself
wide open to legal prosecution.

The scene of his activities had
been Seneca Square. He had dese-
crated the alabaster statue of the
Seneca Dealer by writing "Thou
shalt not steal!" across its base,
and he had desecrated the Bluebird,
which had just been put on dis-

88

play, by printing "Golden Calf H"
on its windshield. Moreover, the
announcer said, the Construction
Engineer had performed both acts
in the presence of a dozen witnesses,
all of whom were willing to testify
against him. It was as though he
were proud of his heretic vandal-
ism, though not proud enough — the
announcer added — to remain on
the scene till the police arrived.

"Mr. District Attorney has let it
be known," the announcer con-
cluded, "that every force at his
command will be utilized to appre-
hend this madman in our midst.
Informed sources say that the Con-
struction Engineer is at present hid-
ing out in Center City."

Brett finished the rest of his scal-
lops and lit a cigarette. He won-
dered if the Foundations would
ever get far enough ahead on raw
materials so that they could develop
at least one of their planets along
agricultural lines — a project they
had been promising the people for
decades. Seafood was all right, but
it got monotonous after a while.
Meat wasn't even available on the
black market any more, and pota-
toes were no more than a dream
remembered.

But the economy came first, and
automobiles were the backbone of
the economy, and you couldn't very
well manufacture automobiles with-
out the necessary metals and people
couldn't very well drive them with-
out the necessary fuel. Besides,
there were plenty of fish in the
ocean, so there wasn't really any
need for extra-terrestrial agricul-
tural development — as long as traf-
fic fatalities continued to counter-

ROBERT F. YOUNG

balance population.

Brett paid the electronic cashier
and went outside. The sky was
more briskly blue than before, and
the breeze coming in over the fac-
toried fields was acrid with spring.
High in the sky a jet was strato-
sphere-writing. Brett watched idly
as the lofty letters emerged:

BUY A BLUEBIRD TODAY!

He smiled. No, not today, he
thought. Nor tomorrow. His court-
ship of Linda was going to take a
little time.

But definitely by Turn-In Friday!

COURTING LINDA, Brett dis-
covered, had a Fitzgerald effect
on time.

At first she was very quiet when
he picked her up for their second
date, opening the door of her apart-
ment before he even had time to
knock, then closing the door quick-
ly behind her and taking his arm.
But her quietness gave way to gaye-
ty when he took her to the latest
identi-scope where they became
vicarious bride and groom in a
hilarious highway marriage. After-
wards on the Raceway she snuggled
against his shoulder, so close that
her soft hair tickled his neck and
her perfume enveloped him like an
enchanted cloud. Almost before he
knew it, it was time to take her
home.

That was Monday night. Tues-
day night he took her dining, and
later in the evening they found a
charming little cafe in the country
where you could sit at a rustic
table in a secluded corner and lis-
ten to the muted strains of the

latest love songs, and drink and
talk—

They talked of many things.
Brett talked about his work, and
she listened attentively. But when
it came time for her to talk about
her work, she said very little, only
that she was a secretary and that
she hated her job. Brett thought he
understood her reticence and did
not press her.

After a while the Construction
Engineer crept into their conver-
sation. "I can't figure him out,"
Brett said. "What's he trying to ac-
complish?"

"He has a Christ-complex," Lin-
da said. "Can't you recognize the
pattern?"

"You mean he thinks he's
Christ?"

Linda's voice had become bitter.
"Yes. He thinks he's Christ."

"But he's never claimed to be."

"Of course not. Did Christ ever
publicly claim to be the Messiah?
It's all a part of the pattern. His
disappearance a year ago was sup-
posed to symbolize Christ's sojourn
in the wilderness, and his 3V ha-
rangues are supposed to symbolize
the ministry in Galilee; his anti-
social demonstration in Seneca
Square the other night was sup-
posed to represent Christ's conflict
with the Pharisees and the San-
hedrin. He's deliberately seeking
both persecution and prosecution
now, and probably will contrive
some way of attaining symbolic
crucifixion."

"But why?" Brett demanded.

Linda's eyes were on the cheq-
uered tablecloth. Sadness routed
the bitterness from her voice. "Be-

CHROME PASTURES

89

cause he's sick," she said. "Though
of course he thinks that we are the
ones who are sick and that he is
the physician come to cure us. By
playing Christ he hopes to change
society — eliminate the automobile,
the Raceways, and so forth. His
perspective is so warped that he
can't realize that a high traffic
fatality rate is the only effective
way to counterbalance population
increase; that the public's endorse-
ment of the Church of the Happy
Traveler is not the result of mate-
rialism but of economic pressure ; or
that economic pressure is merely a
civilized way of saying 'fear of
hunger'. Considering the economic
importance of the automobile to
the average consumer, its apotheo-
sis isn't any more abnormal than
the fertility rites of the ancient
Egyptians, or the worship of the
rain gods by the Zuni."

"You seem to know a lot about
him," Brett said. "Why are you so
interested in him?"

"Because — Oh, never mind. I
don't want to talk about him any
more!" She raised her eyes and the
desperation in them astonished
him. "It's so close in here. Can't we
go riding somewhere?"

"The Raceway?"

"Yes. Yes. The Raceway. And
drive fast, Mark. Fast , . ."

The Construction Engineer was
apprehended the next morning.
Brett was eating a late breakfast
when the bulletin bulb on his 3V
turned red and began to buzz. He
went into the living room and toed
the set on, depressing the channel
pedal till the buzzing stopped and

90

the light went off.

A familiar room appeared on the
screen and Brett recognized it as
the vicarage office. There was the
bench, and there was the acolyte's
window, and beyond the window —

Brett gasped. He had never seen
so many overturned tables and
chairs before, so many papers of all
description scattered about. In the
middle of the shambles stood the
Seneca Dealer, and beside him
stood On-the-spot Harrigan, the
traveling newscaster. An interview
was in progress.

The Dealer was saying. "He per-
formed the whole sacrilegious act
right in front of me. But as I said, I
couldn't raise a finger to stop him.
There was something about the
way he looked at me— As though —
As though he felt sorry for me."

"But why should he feel sorry
for you of all people, Father?"

"I don't know," the Dealer said.

"Well all I can say is he should
have saved his pity for himself,"
On-the-spot Harrigan said mean-
ingfully. "He's going to need it." He
turned and faced the eye of the
3V camera. "Yes folks," he went
on, "he's going to need it real bad.
For our minions of the law have
him safely in custody, and Mr. Dis-
trict Attorney assures me that he'll
have this infamous scoundrel shack-
led in the brig of the prison ship
before Turn-In Friday."

Brett toed off the set and re-
turned to his breakfast. He won-
dered what Linda would have to
say regarding this new develop-
ment.

She didn't say anything about it.
She was pale and listless when he

ROBERT F. YOUNG

picked her up that night, and all
she wanted to do was ride on the
Raceway. He couldn't drive fast
enough to suit her.

Brett was disgusted. He'd
planned to propose to her, but you
couldn't propose to a girl while you
were hurtling at a one hundred
thirty mile per hour clip through
a veritable river of cars. He decided
to wait till he took her home, but
when he pulled up before Building
14 she got out of the car before he
had a chance to say a word; then,
as though remembering his exis-
tence, she leaned through the open
window and kissed him warmly on
the lips. "I know I've been terribly
poor company," she said. "But I'll
make up for it tomorrow night."

"Promise?" Brett said.

"Promise!"

And then she was gone and he
was sitting alone in the car. It be-
gan to rain and he drove home in
the rain, wondering if he was going
to get the Bluebird after all.

There was only one day left.

He proposed to her the next
night. He didn't wait for the right
moment, the right background, the
right anything. Time was running
out, and not only that, there was a
desperation inside him that he
could not analyze, that he was
afraid to analyze. "Will you marry
me, Linda?" he said when she an-
swered his knock.

She paused in the doorway, love-
ly in her white dress. She did not
close the door behind her as she
had the night before and he could
see the bare peeling walls of the
apartment behind her.

CHROME PASTURES

She said:

"You can't be serious, Mark!"

"Yes I can." The huskiness of
his voice surprised him. His words
sounded sincere even to himself.

Apparently they sounded sincere
to Linda too, for she said, "When?"

"Right now," Brett said. His
heart was pounding painfully and
it was all he could do to keep from
taking her in his arms and kissing
away whatever objections she might
have. His passion for the Bluebird
astonished him; he could not re-
call a time when the prospect of
getting a car had had so profound
an effect upon his emotions.

"You forgot one thing," Linda
said. "When you propose to a girl
you're supposed to tell her you love
her."

Her large limpid eyes were on
his face as though daring him to
say the words. A little ways down
the hall a husband-wife fight was
in progress, and from somewhere
nearby a baby was squalling lustily.
But even though the background
was definitely detrimental to ro-
mance, Brett found that he could
say the words easily.

"I love you," he said.

Her eyes dropped then. "I'll get
my things," she said.

She had pitifully few belong-
ings: an armful of clothes, a hand-
ful of trinkets, and a half dozen
books. Most of the books, Brett
noticed, were written by the same
author — someone named Freud. He
helped her carry them down to the
car.

By ten o'clock they were man
and wife, thanks to the efficiency
of the marriage processing bureau

91

which was open twenty-four hours
a day. Across the street from the
marriage bureau was the separa-
tion bureau which maintained the
same hours and the same efficiency.

"I think the occasion calls for
champagne," Brett said.

"But darling, it's fabulously ex-
pensive."

"We aren't going to drink an
ocean of it. Just a glass or two. I've
got the midnight turn tonight, so
that's all we'll have time for any-
way."

He chose a glittering bar on the
business boulevard not far from the
Seneca Cathedral. Czech was there,
sipping a Dream Girl at the bar.
Brett waved to him as he ushered
Linda to a private table, and Czech
waved back, his eyes protuberant
with surprise. Linda gave a little
start when Czech's eyes met hers.
She glanced away quickly. At first
Brett felt self-conscious about being
out with a White Collar girl; then
he remembered that this particular
girl was his wife and his self-con-
sciousness was supplanted by pride.
His pride, in turn, was supplanted
by bewilderment : why in the world
should he feel proud of Linda?

The inevitable 3V screen iri-
desced behind the bar, strategically
located so that it was visible — and
audible — to every customer in the
place. Brett didn't want to watch
3V, but when he saw the direction
Linda's eyes had taken, his own
eyes followed.

A bulletin had just been issued.
The Construction Engineer had
been tried, found guilty of car-
desecration, and sentenced to hard
labor for the rest of his life in the

Foundation mines. Two car thieves
had received similar sentences at
the same tribunal, and all three
sentences were to be carried out im-
mediately.

The scene shifted from the studio
and the announcer to the space-
port. On-the-spot Harrigan was
standing at the foot of a mobile
Jacob's lift. On the platform of the
lift stood three men manacled to-
gether. Brett recognized the man
in the middle as the Construction
Engineer.

"You cannot sin against your
society and survive," On-the-spot
Harrigan said sententiously. "The
three prisoners you see standing be-
fore you have cheated on the Ride
and now they must pay the Chauf-
feur."

He raised one arm dramatically
and the platform began to rise.
The camera followed it. The three
men stood pale and silent, their
faces touched by starlight. Present-
ly the bright rectangle of the open
lock came into view and the plat-
form stopped. Two guards stepped
forth and ushered the prisoners
into the ship. The lock swung shut
and the scene faded out.

Brett became aware of Linda's
fingers digging into his wrist. When
he turned to her the whiteness of
her face frightened him.

"That ship," she said. "It's the
one we saw that night we parked
on that hill, isn't it?"

"That's the one," Brett said. "It
blasts at dawn tomorrow —

"And the hill we were parked
on. What was its name?"

"Skull Hill. You haven't touched
your champagne."

ROBERT F. YOUNG

"Skull Hill. Of course. The pat-
tern was too perfect, it might never
occur again. The fool, the poor,
pitiful fool . . ."

Her eyes glistened oddly in the
rose-tinted light of the table lamp.
Brett looked at her for a moment,
wanting to question her, and yet re-
luctant to question her because he
was afraid he might get answers he
did not want to hear. Out of the
corner of his eye he saw that Czech
was looking at her too, staring at
her as though he couldn't get over
the fact that his turn buddy had
fallen for a White Collar girl.

Again the sequence of self-con-
sciousness, pride, and bewilderment
ran its gamut of Brett's emotions.
But this time another phase was
added. Realization. With a shock
he recognized his real reason for
marrying Linda. The Bluebird, for
all its chrome and grandeur, had
been nothing more than a ration-
alization, a means whereby he could
fit an incongruous item into his
rigid set of values. And the item
was love . . .

Brett stood up. "We can go home
if you want to," he said. He took
her arm and escorted her proudly
to the door. He hoped that Czech
was still watching but he did not
turn his head to look. Suddenly he
felt sorry for Czech.

The 2000-2400 man had tapped
43 and when Brett took over the
heat was still running into the pit
ladle. He gave 41 a drink while he
was waiting and by the time he re-
placed the hot metal ladle the last
of 43's contents had run out and
Czech was already pouring the

CHROME PASTURES

heat. Brett dried 43's bottom with
the robo-shoveler and closed the
tap hole. He started number 1
charger on the limestone charge.

Czech called. "Where'd you meet
the Finance Bishop's secretary?"

Brett had anticipated the call but
he hadn't anticipated the question.
He'd anticipated a number of other
questions and he had his answers
ready. But this one caught him un-
prepared.

"Whose secretary?"

"The F. B.'s. Don't tell me you
didn't know she works for His
Holiness himself!"

The control booth seemed sud-
denly cold.

"She's some number all right,"
Czech went on when he got no
answer. "White Collar girl or not!
I saw her Sunday morning when I
went before the F. B. She was just
leaving when I got there. I heard
her tell His Holiness she had an im-
portant appointment, and away she
went! where'd you meet her?"

The suspicion in Brett's mind
was as yet no more than a minus-
cule seed but it was germinating
rapidly. "I'll tell you later," he
said. "The scrap charge just came
up and I've got to get it started."

He couldn't feel his fingers they
were so numb, but they were so
familiar with the console of the
r.c. panel that they directed the
charge of their own accord. The
whole pattern of Linda's deceit
emerged and arrayed itself mock-
ingly before his eyes. She had
known about the Finance Bishop's
new restriction long before anyone
else — months in advance, probably
— and she had seen in it an oppor-

93

tunity to escape from the sidewalks
to the boulevard, from the crum-
bling canyons of Center City to the
idyllic garages of Peripheral City,
from poverty to security ; and above
all she had seen an opportunity to
get the Bluebird.

As secretary to the Finance Bish-
op she had access to the dossier of
every car owner in the city. She
had known which marriageable car
owners would be affected by the
new restriction and to find the most
likely prospect she had merely
needed to study their character
analyses, their personal histories,
and their financial statuses.

She had finally narrowed the
prospects down — probably after a
great deal of deliberation — to a sin-
gle name : Marcus Brett.

As secretary to the Finance Bish-
op she also had access to the floor
plan of every cathedral in the city.
To arrange a meeting at the most
opportune moment all she had had
to do was vacate the seat next to
Brett's. This she had done by de-
liberately neglecting to process
Czech's last ten payments, by call-
ing the Finance Bishop's attention
to Czech's payment record a day or
two before Display Sunday, and by
coinciding Czech's appointment
with the Finance Bishop with the
unveiling of the Bluebird.

The rest had been a gamble — a
gamble abetted by a perfume that
was probably aphrodisiacal, a baby
face, a goddess-figure, and a pro-
ficiency in the art of dissimulation.

Brett's fingers were no longer
numb. They were taut and pur-
poseful, depressing combinations of
switches with cold efficiency. He

94

took a test bar of 41. He filled the
manganese pan for 43. He gave 42
a shot of spar.

The pit phone rang. Brett let it
ring.

WHEN BRETT got home that
morning Linda had disap-
peared. The windows of the over-
head apartment were gray with
dawn and the bulletin bulb was
buzzing angrily. When he went into
the living room Brett saw the fold-
ed sheet of paper propped before
the 3V screen. Wonderingly, he
picked it up and unfolded it. He
read the hastily written words in
the red light of the bulletin bulb:

Dear Mark,

Czech recognized me tonight and
by now he has probably told you
where he saw me. No doubt you've
guessed part of the truth and no
doubt you hate me. When I tell
you the whole truth you will de-
spise me.

Five years ago my mother was
horribly mutilated in a ten car
pileup on the Raceway. She lived
for almost a year, if you can call
existence without a face, without
sight, without hearing, without
vocal chords, living. My father
never left her side. The only sound
she ever made was a thin whis-
tling sound. I heard it only once. He
must have heard it many times. My
father is the Construction Engineer.

After my mother's death, he
went back to work. That is, part of
him went back to work. The rest of
him brooded. He did not break
down till a year ago at the laying

ROBERT F. YOUNG

of the cornerstone of the Seneca
Memorial Trust Building, and he
did not break down then, really;
the inner part of him took over —
the part that had exhaustively sys-
tematized the factors that resulted
in my mother's death and dis-
covered that society was to blame.

I reacted to my mother's death
differently. I was young and I had
only heard the whistling sound
once. To me my mother's death
was tragic, but I did not hold socie-
ty responsible. Society was nothing
more to me than a musty concept
and had nothing to do with the
glittering galaxy of objects almost
within my reach — objects made all
the more desirable by my father's
refusal to let me touch them.

Shortly after my mother's ac-
cident I was taken out of tech
school and forbidden to ride in any
kind of car whatsoever. My friends
refused to associate with me; the
world I had taken for granted came
tumbling down around me. Own-
ing a car of my own became more
than a conditioned reflex for me:
it became an obsession.

I was twenty-one when my father
began his symbolical acts. That
was when I left home. I never saw
him again till last week when he
came to Center City and asked me
to hide him from the police. Yes-
terday morning he left the apart-
ment and committed his penulti-
mate symbolic act — the overturn-
ing of the tables in the "temple".

When I left home there was no
place for me to go except Center
City. (All my near relatives are list-
ed in the traffic fatality files). My
technical education had been cut

CHROME PASTURES

short, so I couldn't obtain a re-
spectable position; however, I was
literate enough to obtain a white
collar job, and I finally did obtain
one — with the Finance Bishop.

I had only one aim in life — to
get a car. The opportunity I had
been waiting for turned up two
months ago when the Finance
Bishop drafted his new restriction.
I selected you as the most logical
prospect and contrived to meet you.
That much you probably know al-
ready. What you don't know is
that part of the F.B.'s restriction
never got through to the Dealers —
the proviso that reads: "Any person
who has defaulted on more than
two payments during the recent
caryear and who chooses alternative
number 2 (marriage) must agree
to forfeit his or her purchase to his
or her marriage partner in the
event of a divorce or an annul-
ment." I saw to it that it didn't go
through — but it'll be a part of the
contract you'll sign tomorrow.

Now you merely hate me. But in
a moment you'll despise me.

When you were eight you fell in
love with your mother. You fell
in love with her in an apple or-
chard on an afternoon in June,
and the apple trees were in blos-
som. It's all there in your dossier.
Finance psycho-analysts, like all
psycho-analysts, are primarily in-
terested in the Oedipal phase, even
when it is normal.

All children fall in love with
their sexually opposite parent at
one time or another, and to a vary-
ing degree, carry the parent's imago
in their mind. But the imago is not
merely a mental picture of the

95

parent: it is a composite memory^
a memory compounded of sur-
roundings and sound; of sight and
smell and taste.

My perfume called your mother
to your mind, whether you were
aware of it or not. The taste of her
lip rouge was enough to complete
the illusion (1 had access to her
dossier too, and I had the rouge
made especially.) The combined
attack upon the two senses brought
back the feeling of security and love
which you once felt in your moth-
er's presence, and reawakened your
idealization of her. Arid you trans-
ferred that idealization to me.

In retrospect it seems fantastic
that I should have gone to such
extremes to acquire an object
which, now that I can acquire it,
means utterly nothing to me.

When you sign the contract to-
morrow you needn't worry about
the proviso. I don't want the Blue-
bird. I was glossing over the truth
when I said that the apotheosis of
the automobile wasn't any more ab-
normal than the fertility rites of the
ancient Egyptians or the worship
of the rain gods by the Zuni. I
wanted to prove to you — and there-
by prove to myself — that my father
was wrong in his denunciation of
the Church of the Happy Traveler.
Fear of hunger seldom gives birth
to noble concepts, and hucksters
are poor substitutes for men of God.
My father was right in everything
he said.

You're wondering by now what
made me change my mind, and
why I'm writing this. I have been
sitting here in this absurd over-
head apartment ever since you left,

96

thinking of how clever I have been.
But I forgot one thing — -the most
important thing of all. I forgot
that I, too, had been a child once,
and that I had fallen in love with
my sexually opposite parent.

Do you know when I fell in love
with my father, Mark? I fell in
love with him the first time he
took me riding on the Raceway.

Linda

Brett stood in the gray room
waiting for the hatred to rise in
him. He stood there waiting for a
long time, cold and empty. Present-
ly he became aware of the buzzing
of the bulletin bulb and he turned
the 3V set on and depressed the
channel pedal till the buzzing
stopped and the light went out.

There on the screen before him
was the prison ship, gaunt in the
dawnlight. Behind it was Skull
Hill, its blackened top a smudge
against the pinkening sky. On the
edge of the man-made cliff border-
ing the blast pit stood a tiny figure
— unidentifiable to the casual ob-
server, unmistakable to Brett.

His emptiness left him abruptly,
and he realized why he had been
unable to feel hatred. The sight of
Linda standing there awaiting
cremation in the backwash of the
prison ship brought home to him
the truth that love is a thing-in-
itself, unrelated to the factors that
motivate it.

And then he was running down
the stairs to the garage and climb-
ing into the Seneca — and remem-
bering, almost too late, the death
trap he had set for thieves.

The bullet struck Brett in the

ROBERT F. YOUNG

shoulder as he made a convulsive
effort to get out of the car. He felt
no pain, only numbness, and the
numbness spread all through him,
turning into rage. He bent and
tore the deadly mechanism from
its fastenings and hurled it, trail-
ing wires and all, against the back
of the garage, all the while marvel-
ing how any human being could
value a possession more highly
than he valued his own life.

He drove furiously through the
streets of Peripheral City, finally
gained the Raceway. With luck he
could reach her in time and with
more luck he could get her to safe-
ty before the prison ship blasted.
Just before he came to the turnoff
he passed a four car pileup — two
Senecas, an Oneida, and a Cortez.
The cars were mangled and there
were mangled bodies in them, and
shattered glass and blood inter-
mingled on the macadam. The sal-
vage crew was already on the scene,
separating flesh from metal. As
usual, there were no survivors.

Brett had seen a thousand pile-
ups but none of them had ever
bothered him. This one, why he
did not know, horrified him. He
kept seeing the flesh and the metal
and the blood long after he had
left the Raceway behind, and for
the first time he asked himself the
question : Why?

The spires of the ships came into
view against the brightening sky
and Brett slowed. He noticed an
acrid odor and traced it to the
shorted wires behind the dash. His
Seneca was on fire! His every in-
stinct screamed for him to stop and
extinguish the flames but the

CHROME PASTURES

thought of Linda standing on the
blackened hilltop froze his foot to
the accelerator and his eyes to the
sky where, any moment, he expect-
ed to see the prison ship rise on an
incandescent geyser.

A barrier had been erected
across the entrance to Skull Hill
road and a new sign said: ROAD
WASHED OUT. Brett parked the
Seneca on the shoulder of the high-
way and fumbled beneath the seat
for the fire extinguisher. Abruptly
the Brobdingnagian voice of the
port tower came to life —

"The Gethsemane now blasting
from pit 32. Payload: sixty pris-
oners for occupational assignment.
Destination: Alpha Crucis Four-
teen. . .

"One minute — "

Brett stood paralyzed, the fire
extinguisher in his hands.

"Fifty-nine seconds — "

Without a car as a down pay-
ment he would never be able to buy
the Bluebird.

"Fifty-eight seconds — "

He would lose his job, his garage,
his social status —

"Fifty-seven seconds — "

Everything he had valued so
highly, everything — except Linda —

"Fifty-six seconds — "

The fire extinguisher slipped
from Brett's fingers and he began
running up the hill. As he ran, a
burden slipped from his shoulders
and his heart found a new rhythm
— a cadence that pounded through
his whole body apprising his every
cell of the new freedom.

"Nineteen seconds — "

He glimpsed the hull of the
(Continued on page 120)

97

Illustrated by Paul Orban

love story

Everything was aimed at satisfying the whims of women.
The popular cliches, the pretty romances, the catchwords
of advertising became realities; and the compound kept

the men enslaved. George knew what he had to do

98

BY IRVING E. COX, JR.

THE DUTY bell rang and
obediently George clattered
down the steps from his confine-
ment cubicle over the garage. His
mother's chartreuse-colored Cadil-
lac convertible purred to a stop in
the drive.

"It's so sweet of you to come,
Georgie," his mother said when
George opened the door for her.

"Whenever you need me, Mum-
my." It was no effort at all to keep
the sneer out of his voice. Decep-
tion had become a part of his char-
acter.

His mother squeezed his arm. "I
can always count on my little boy
to do the right thing."

"Yes, Mummy." They were
mouthing a formula of words. They
were both very much aware that if
George hadn't snapped to attention
as soon as the duty bell rang, he
risked being sentenced, at least
temporarily, to the national hero's
corps.

Still in the customary, martyr's
whisper, George's mother said,
"This has been such a tiring day.
A man can never understand what
a woman has to endure, Georgie;
my life is such an ordeal." Her tone
turned at once coldly practical.
"I've two packages in the trunk;
carry them to the house for me."

George picked up the cardboard
boxes and followed her along the
brick walk in the direction of the
white, Colonial mansion where his
mother and her two daughters and
her current husband lived. George,

being a boy, was allowed in the
house only when his mother in-
vited him, or when he was being
shown off to a prospective bride.
George was nineteen, the most ac-
ceptable marriage age; because he
had a magnificent build and the
reputation for being a good boy,
his mother was rumored to be ask-
ing twenty thousand shares for him.

As they passed the rose arbor,
his mother dropped on the wooden
seat and drew George down beside
her. "I've a surprise for you,
George — a new bidder. Mrs. Har-
per is thinking about you for her
daughter."

"Jenny Harper?" Suddenly his
throat was dust dry with excite-
ment.

"You'd like that, wouldn't you,
Georgie?"

"Whatever arrangement you
make, Mummy." Jenny Harper
was one of the few outsiders George
had occasionally seen as he grew
up. She was approximately his age,
a stunning, dark-eyed brunette.

"Jenny and her mother are com-
ing to dinner to talk over a mar-
riage settlement." Speculatively she
ran her hand over the tanned,
muscle-hard curve of his upper
arm. "You're anxious to have your
own woman, aren't you, George?"

"So I can begin to work for her.
Mummy." That, at least, was the
correct answer, if not an honest
one.

"And begin taking the com-
pound every day." His mother
smiled. "Oh, I know you wicked
boys! Put on your dress trunks to-
night. We want Jenny to see you at
your best."

99

She got up and strode toward the
house again. George followed re-
spectfully two paces behind her. As
they passed beyond the garden
hedge, she saw the old business
coupe parked in the delivery court.
Her body stiffened in anger. "Why
is your father home so early, may I
ask?" It was an accusation, rather
than a question.

"I don't know, Mother. I heard
my sisters talking in the yard; I
think he was taken sick at work."

"Sick! Some men never stop
pampering themselves."

"They said it was a heart attack
or —

"Ridiculous; he isn't dead, is he?
Georgie, this is the last straw. I in-
tend to trade your father in today
on a younger man." She snatched
the two packages from him and
stormed into the house.

Since his mother hadn't asked
him in, George returned to his
confinement cubicle in the garage.
He felt sorry, in an impersonal way,
for the husband his mother was
about to dispose of, but otherwise
the fate of the old man was quite
normal. He had outlived his eco-
nomic usefulness; George had seen
it happen before. His real father
had died a natural death — from
strain and overwork — when George
was four. His mother had since
then bought four other husbands;
but, because boys were brought up
in rigid isolation, George had
known none of them well. For the
same reason, he had no personal
friends.

He climbed the narrow stairway
to his cubicle. It was already late
afternoon, almost time for dinner.

100

He showered and oiled his body
carefully, before he put on his dress
trunks, briefs made of black silk
studded with seed pearls and small
diamonds. He was permitted to
wear the jewels because his moth-
er's stockholdings were large
enough to make her an Associate
Director. His family status gave
George a high marriage value and
his Adonis physique kicked the ask-
ing price still higher. At nineteen
he stood more than six feet tall,
even without his formal, high-
heeled boots. He weighed one hun-
dred and eighty-five, not an ounce
of it superfluous fat. His skin was
deeply bronzed by the sunlamps in
the gym; his eyes were sapphire
blue; his crewcut was a platinum
blond— thanks to the peroxide
wash his mother made him use.

Observing himself critically in
the full-length mirror, George knew
his mother was justified in asking
twenty thousand shares for him.
Marriage was an essential part of
his own plans; without it revenge
was out of his reach. He desperate-
ly hoped the deal would be made
with Jenny Harper. A young wom-
an would be far less difficult for
him to handle.

When the oil on his skin was dry,
he lay down on his bunk to
catch up on his required viewing
until the duty bell called him to
the house. The automatic circuit
snapped on the television screen
above his bunk; wearily George
fixed his eyes on the unreeling love
story.

For as long as he could remem-
ber, television had been a fun-
damental part of his education. A

IRVING E. COX, JR.

federal law required every male to
watch the TV romances three hours
a day. Failure to do so — and that
was determined by monthly form
tests mailed out by the Directorate
— meant a three month sentence to
the national hero's corps. If the
statistics periodically published by
the Directorate were true, George
was a relatively rare case, having
survived adolescence without serv-
ing a single tour of duty as a
national hero. For that he indirect-
ly thanked his immunity to the
compound. Fear and guilt kept him
so much on his toes, he grew up an
amazingly well-disciplined child.

George was aware that the tele-
vision romances were designed to
shape his attitudes and his emo-
tional reactions. The stories end-
lessly repeated his mother's philos-
ophy. All men were pictured as
beasts crudely dominated by lust.
Women, on the other hand, were
always sensitive, delicate, modest,
and intelligent; their martyrdom to
the men in their lives was called
love. To pay for their animal lusts,
men were expected to slave away
their lives earning things — kitchen
gadgets, household appliances,
fancy cars, luxuries and stockhold-
ings — for their patient, long-suffer-
ing wives.

And it's all a fake! George
thought. He had seen his Mother
drive two men to their graves and
trade off two others because they
hadn't produced luxuries as fast as
she demanded. His mother and his
pinch-faced sisters were pampered,
selfish, rock-hard Amazons; by no
conceivable twist of imagination
could they be called martyrs to

LOVE STORY

anything.

That seemed self-evident, but
George had no way of knowing if
any other man had ever reasoned
out the same conclusion. Maybe he
was unique because of his immuni-
ty to the compound. He was sure
that very few men— possibly none
— had reached marriage age with
their immunity still undiscovered.

George was lucky, in a way: he
knew the truth about himself when
he was seven, and he had time to
adjust to it — to plan the role he
had been acting for the past twelve
years. His early childhood had been
a livid nightmare, primarily because
of the precocious cruelty of his two
sisters. Shortly before his seventh
birthday they forced him to take
part in a game they called cocktail
party. The game involved only one
activity: the two little girls filled a
glass with an unidentified liquid,
and ordered George to drink. After-
ward, dancing up and down in
girlish glee, they said they had
given him the compound.

George had seen the love stories
on television; he knew how he was
expected to act. He gave a good
performance — better than his sis-
ters realized, for inside his mind
George was in turmoil. They had
given him the compound (true,
years before he should have taken
it), and nothing had happened. He
had felt absolutely nothing; he was
immune ! If anyone had ever found
out, George would have been given
a life sentence to the national
hero's corps; or, more probably,
the Morals Squad would have dis-
posed of him altogether.

101

From that day on, George lived
with guilt and fear. As the years
passed, he several times stole cap-
sules of the compound from his
mother's love-cabinet and gulped
them down. Sometimes he felt a
little giddy, and once he was sick.
But he experienced no reaction
which could possibly be defined as
love. Not that he had any idea
what that reaction should have
been, but he knew he was supposed
to feel very wicked and he never
did.

Each failure increased the agony
of guilt; George drove himself to
be far better behaved than he was
required to be. He dreaded making
one mistake. If his mother or a
Director examined it too closely,
they might find out his real secret.

George's basic education began
when he was assigned to his con-
finement room above the garage
after his tenth birthday. There-
after his time was thoroughly reg-
ulated by law. Three hours a day
he watched television; three hours
he spent in his gym, building a
magnificent — and salable — body;
for four hours he listened to the
educational tapes. Arithmetic, eco-
nomics, salemanship, business tech-
niques, accounting, mechanics,
practical science : the things he had
to know in order to earn a satis-
factory living for the woman who
bought him in marriage.

He learned nothing else and as
he grew older he became very con-
scious of the gaps in his education.
For instance, what of the past?
Had the world always been this
sham he lived in? That question he
had the good sense not to ask.

102

But George had learned enough
from his lessons in practical science
to guess what the compound really
was, what it had to be: a mixture
of aphrodisiacs and a habit-forming
drug. The compound was calculat-
ed to stir up a man's desire to the
point where he would give up any-
thing in order to satisfy it. Boys
were given increased doses during
their adolescence; by the time they
married, they were addicts, unable
to leave the compound alone.

George couldn't prove his con-
clusion. He had no idea how many
other men had followed the same
line of reasoning and come up with
the same answer. But why was
George immune? There was only
one way he could figure it: it must
have happened because his sisters
gave him the first draft when he
was seven. But logically that didn't
make much sense.

Bachelors were another sort of
enemy: men who shirked their
duty and deserted their wives. It
seemed unreasonable to believe a
man could desert his wife, when
first he had to break himself of
addiction to the compound. George
had always supposed that bachelor
was a boogy word contrived to
frighten growing children.

As a consequence, he was very
surprised when the house next door
was raided. Through the window
of his confinement cubicle, he ac-
tually saw the five gray-haired men
who were rounded up by the Mor-
als Squad. The Squad — heavily
armed, six-foot Amazons — tried to
question their captives. They used
injections of a truth serum. Two of
the old men died at once. The

IRVING E. COX, JR.

others went berserk, frothing at the
mouth and screaming animal pro-
fanity until the Squad captain or-
dered them shot.

George overheard one of the
women say, "It's always like this.
They take something so our serum
can't be effective."

Later that afternoon George
found a scrap of paper in his moth-
er's garden. It had blown out of the
bonfire which the Morals Squad
made of the papers they took out of
the house next door. The burned
page had apparently been part of
an informational bulletin, compiled
by the bachelors for distribution
among themselves.

". . . data compiled from old
publications," the fragment began,
"and interpreted by our most re-
liable authorities." At that point a

part of the page was burned away.
". . .and perhaps less than ninety
years ago men and women lived m
equality. The evidence on that
point is entirely conclusive. The
present matriarchy evolved by ac-
cident, not design. Ninety years ago
entertainment and advertising were
exclusively directed at satisfying a
woman's whim. No product was
sold without some sort of tie-in
with women. Fiction, drama, tele-
vision, motion pictures — all glori-
fied a romantic thing called love.
In that same period business was in
the process of taking over govern-
ment from statesmen and politi-
cians. Women, of course, were the
stockholders who owned big busi-
ness, although the directors and
managers at that time were still
men — operating under the illusion

STATEMENT OF THE OWNERSHIP, MANAGEMENT, AND CIRCULATION REQUIRED BY THE

ACT OF CONGRESS OF AUGUST 24, 1912, AS AMENDED BY THE ACTS OF

MARCH 3, 19,'!3, AND JULY 2, 1946 (39 V. S. C. 233)

Of IF, published bi-monthly at Buffalo, New York, for October 1, 1955.

1. The names and addresses of the publisher, editor, managing editor, and business
managers are: Publisher, Quinn Publishing Company, Inc., 17 Pearl Street, Kingston, N. Y.;
Editor, James L. Quinn, 17 Pearl Street, Kingston, N. Y.; Managing editor. None. Business
tnanager. None.

2. The owner is (if owned by a corporation, its name and address must be stated and
also immediately thereunder the names and addresses of stocicholders owning or holding 1
per cent or more of total amount of stock) : Quinn Publishing Company, Inc., 17 Pearl Street,
Kingston, N. Y.; James L. Quinn, 17 Pearl Street, Kingston, N. Y.

3. The known bondholders, mortgagees, and other security holders owning or holding 1
per cent or more of total amount of bonds, mortgages, or other securities are: None.

4. The two _ paragraphs next above, giving the names of owners, stockholders, and
security holders, if any, contain not only the list of stockholders and security holders as they
appear upon the books of the company but also, in cases where the stockholders or security
holder appears upon the books of the company as trustee or in any other fiduciary relation,
the name of the person or corporation for whom such trustee is acting, is given; also that
the said two paragraphs contain statements embracing affiant's full knowledge and belief as
to the circumstances and conditions under which stockholders and security holders who do not
appear upon the books of the company as trustees, hold stock and securities in a capacity
other than that of a bona fide owner; and this affiant has no reason to believe that any
other person, association, or corporation has any interest direct or indirect in the said stock,
bonds, or other securities than as so stated by him.

5. The average number of copies of each issue of this publication sold or distributed,
through the mails or otherwise, to paid subscribers during the 12 months preceding the date
shown above was: (This information is required from daily, weekly, semiweekly, and tri-
weekly newspapers only) ,

James L. Quinn, Editor.
Sworn to and subscribed before me this 26th day of September, 1955.
(SEAL) Charles H. Gaffney (My commission expires March SO, 1956)

LOVE STORY

103

that they were the executives who
represented ownership. In eflfect,
however, women owned the coun-
try and women governed it; sud-
denly the matriarchy existed. There
is no evidence that it was imposed;
there is no suggestion of civil strife
or . . ." More words burned away.
"However, the women were not un-
willing to consolidate their gains.
Consequently the popular cliches,
the pretty romances, and the catch-
words of advertising became a sub-
stitute for reality. As for the
compound . . ."

There the fragment ended. Much
of it George did not understand.
But it gave him a great deal of
courage simply to know the bache-
lors actually existed. He began to
plan his own escape to a bachelor
hideout. He would have no oppor-
tunity, no freedom of any sort, un-
til he married. Every boy was
rigidly isolated in his confinement
cubicle, under the watchful eye of
his mother's spy-cameras, until he
was bought in his first marriage.

Then, as he thought more about
it, George realized there was a bet-
ter way for him to use his immuni-
ty. He couldn't be sure of finding
a bachelor hideout before the Mor-
als Squad tracked him down. But
George could force his bride to tell
him where the compound was
made, since he was not an addict
and she could not use the com-
pound to enslave him. Once he
knew the location of the factory, he
would destroy it. How, he wasn't
sure; he didn't plan that far ahead.
If the supply of the drug could be
interrupted, many hundreds of men
might be goaded into making a

104

break for the hills.

THE DUTY bell rang. George
snapped to attention on the
edge of his bunk. He saw his moth-
er waving from the back door of
her house.

"I'll be down right away, Mum-
my."

His mother was waiting for him
in the pantry. Under the glaring
overhead light he stopped for her
last minute inspection. She used a
pocket-stick to touch up a spot on
his chest where the oil gleam had
faded a little. And she gave him a
glass of the compound to drink.

"Jenny really wants to marry
you, George," she confided. "I
know the symptoms; half our bat-
tle's won for us. And my former
husband won't be around to worry
us with his aches and pains. I made
the trade this afternoon."

He followed her into the dining
room where the cocktails were be-
ing served. Aside from the Harpers,
George's mother had rented two
handsome, muscular escorts for his
sisters. In the confusion, George
saw Jenny Harper's mother stealth-
ily lace his water glass with a dose
of the compound. He suppressed a
grin. Apparently she was anxious
to complete the deal, too.

George found it almost impos-
sible to hold back hilarious laughter
when Jenny herself shyly pressed a
capsule of the compound into his
hand and asked him to use it.
Three full-size slugs of the drug!
George wondered what would have
happened if he hadn't been im-
mune. Fortunately, he knew how

IRVING E. COX, JR.

to act the lusty, eager, drooling
male which each of the women ex-
pected.

The negotiations moved along
without a hitch. George's mother
held out for twenty-eight thousand
shares, and got it. The only prob-
lem left was the date for the wed-
ding, and Jenny settled that very
quickly. "I want my man. Mom,"
she said, "and I want him now."

Jenny always got what she
wanted.

When she and her mother left
that evening, she held George's
hand in hers and whispered ear-
nestly, "So they were married and
lived happily ever after. That's the
way it's going to be with us, isn't it,
George?"

"It's up to you, Jenny; for as
long as you want me."

That was the conventional an-
swer which he was expected to
make, but he saw unmasked disap-
pointment in her face. She wanted
something more genuine, with more
of himself in it. He felt suddenly
sorry for her, for the way he was
going to use her. She was a pretty
girl, even sweet and innocent — if
those words still had any real mean-
ing left after what his mother's
world had done to them. Under
other circumstances, George would
have looked forward with keen
pleasure to marrying Jenny. As it
was, Jenny Harper was first a sym-
bol of the fakery he intended to
destroy, and after that a woman.

Five days later they were mar-
ried. In spite of the short engage-
ment, Mrs. Harper and George's
mother managed to put on a splen-

LOVE STORY

did show in the church. George re-
ceived a business sedan from his
mother, the traditional gift given
every bridegroom; and from Mrs.
Harper he received a good job in
a company where she was the ma-
jority stockholder. And so, in the
customary pageantry and cere-
mony, George became Mr. Harper.

"Think of it— Mr. Harper," Jen-
ny sighed, clinging to his arm.
"Now you're really mine, George."

On the church steps the newly-
weds posed for photographs —
George in the plain, white trunks
which symbolized a first marriage;
Jenny in a dazzling cloud of fluff,
suggestively nearly transparent.
Then Mrs. Harper drew Jenny
aside and whispered in her daugh-
ter's ear: the traditional telling of
the secret. Now Jenny knew where
the compound was manufactured;
and for George revenge was within
his grasp.

George's mother had arranged
for their honeymoon at Memory
Lodge, a resort not far from the
Directorate capital in Hollywood.
It was the national capital as well,
though everyone conscientiously
maintained the pretense that Wash-
ington, with an all-male Congress,
still governed the country. George
considered himself lucky that his
mother had chosen Memory Lodge.
He had already planned to dese'rt
Jenny in the mountains.

George knew how to drive; his
mother had wanted him to do a
great deal of chauffeuring for her.
But he had never driven beyond
town, and he had never driven any-
where alone. His mother gave him
a map on which his route to the

105

lodge was indicated in bright red.
In the foothills George left the
marked highway on a paved side
road.

He gambled that Jenny wouldn't
immediately realize what he had
done, and the gamble paid off.
Still wearing her nearly transparent
wedding gown, she pressed close
to him and ran her hands con-
stantly over his naked chest, thor-
oughly satisfied with the man she
had bought. In the church George
had been given a tall glass of the
compound; he acted the part Jen-
ny expected.

But it was far less a role he
played than George wanted to ad-
mit. His body sang with excitement.
He found it very difficult to hold
the excitement in check. If he had
been addicted to the compound, it
would have been out of the ques-
tion. More than ever before he
sympathized with the men who
were enslaved by love. In spite of
his own immunity, he nearly yield-
ed to the sensuous appeal of her
caress. He held the wheel so hard
his knuckles went white; he
clenched his teeth until his jaw
ached.

All afternoon George drove aim-
less mountain roads, moving deeper
into the uninhabited canyons. Care-
fully judging his distances with an
eye on the map, he saw to it that
he remained relatively close to the
city; after he forced Jenny to give
him the information he wanted, he
wanted to be able to get out fast.

By dusk the roads he drove were
no longer paved. Ruts carved deep
by spring rains suggested long dis-
use. The swaying of the car and the

106

constant grinding of gears even-
tually jolted Jenny out of her ro-
mantic dreams. She moved away
from George and sat looking at the
pines which met above the road.

"We're lost, aren't we?" she
asked.

"What's that?" he shouted to be
heard above the roar of the motor.

"Lost!"

For a minute or two longer he
continued to drive until he saw an
open space under the trees. He
pulled the car into the clearing and
snapped off the ignition. Then he
looked Jenny full in the face and
answered her. "No, Jenny, we
aren't lost; I know exactly what
I'm doing."

"Oh." He was sure she had un-
derstood him, but she said, "We
can spend the night here and find
the lodge in the morning. It's a pity
we didn't bring something to eat."
She smiled ingenuously. "But I
brought the compound; and we
have each other."

They got out of the car. Jenny
looked up at the sunset, dull red
above the trees, and shivered; she
asked George to build a fire. He
tucked the ignition key into the
band of his white trunks and began
to gather dry boughs and pine
needles from the floor of the forest.
He found several large branches
and carried them back to the clear-
ing. There was enough wood to
last until morning — whether he
stayed that long or not. Jenny had
lugged the seats and a blanket out
of the car and improvised a lean-to
close to the fire.

He piled on two of the larger
branches and the bright glow of

IRVING E. COX, JR.

flame lit their faces. She beckoned
to him and gave him a bottle of the
compound, watching bright-eyed as
he emptied it.

With her lips parted, she waited.
He did nothing. Slowly the light
died in her eyes. Like a savage she
flung herself into his arms. He
steeled himself to show absolutely
no reaction and finally she drew
away. Trembling and with tears in
her eyes, she whispered, "The com-
pound doesn't—" The look of pain
in her eyes turned to terror.
"You're immune!"

"Now you know."

"But who told you — " She
searched his face, shaking her head.
"You don't know, do you — not
really?"

"Know what?"

Instead of replying, she asked,
"You brought me here deliberately,
didn't you?"

"So we wouldn't be interrupted.
You see, Jenny, you're going to tell
me where the compound's made."

"It wouldn't do you any good.
Don't you see—" He closed his
hands on her wrists and jerked her
rudely to her feet. He saw her face
go white. And no wonder: that
magnificent, granite hard body,
which she had bought in good faith
for her own pleasure, was suddenly
out of her control. He grinned. He
crushed her mouth against his and
kissed her. Limp in his arms, she
clung to him and said in a choked,
husky whisper, "I love you,
George."

"And you'll make any sacrifice
for love," he replied, mocking the
dialogue of the television love
stories.

LOVE STORY

"Yes, anything!"

"Then tell me where the com-
pound's manufactured."

"Hold me close, George; never
let me go."

How many times had he heard
that particular line! It sickened
him, hearing it now from Jenny; he
had expected something better of
her. He pushed her from him. By
accident his fist raked her face. She
fell back blood trickling from her
mouth. In her eyes he saw shock
and a vague sense of pain ; but both
were overridden by adoration. She
was like a whipped puppy, ready to
lick his hand.

"I'll tell you, George," she whis-
pered. "But don't leave me." She
pulled herself to her feet and stood
beside him, reaching for his hand.
"We make it in Hollywood, in the
Directorate Building, the part that
used to be a sound stage."

"Thanks, Jenny." He picked up
one of the car seats and walked
back to the sedan. She stood mo-
tionless watching him. He fitted the
seat in place and put the key in the
lock. The starter ground away, but
the motor did not turn over.

He glanced back at Jenny. She
was smiling inscrutably, "You see,
George, you have to stay with me."

He got out of the car and moved
toward her.

"I was afraid you were planning
to desert me," she went on, "so I
took out the distributor cap while
you were getting the firewood."

He stood in front of her. Coldly
he demanded, "Where did you put
it, Jenny?"

She tilted her lips toward his.
"Kiss and tell — ^maybe."

W7

"I haven't time for games.
Where is it?"

His fist shot out. Jenny sprawled
on the ground at his feet. Again he
saw the pain and the adoration in
her face. But that couldn't be
right. She would hate him by this
time.

He yanked her to her feet. Her
lips were still bleeding and blood
came now from a wound in her
cheek. Yet she managed to smile
again.

"I don't want to hurt you, Jen-
ny," he told her. "But I have to
have—"

"I love you, George. I never
thought I'd want to give myself
to a man. All the buying doesn't
make any difference, does it? Not
really. And I never knew that be-
fore!"

With an unconscious movement,
she kicked her train aside and he
saw the distributor cap lying be-
neath it. He picked it up. She flung
herself at him screaming. He felt
the hammer beat of her heart; her
fingers dug into his back like cat
claws. Now it didn't matter. He
had the secret; he could go when-
ever he wanted to. Nonetheless he
pushed her away — tenderly, and
with regret. To surrender like this
was no better than a capitulation
to the compound. It was instinc-
tively important to make her un-
derstand that. He knew that much,
but his emotions were churned too
close to fever pitch for him to rea-
son out what else that implied.

He clipped her neatly on the jaw
and put her unconscious body on
the ground by the fire. He left the
map with her so she could find her

108

way out in the morning; he knew
it was really a very short hike to a
highway, where she would be
picked up by a passing car or truck.

He drove out the way he had
come in — at least he tried to re-
member. Four times he took a
wrong turn and had to backtrack.
It was, therefore, dawn before he
reached the outskirts of Hollywood.
In any other city he would not
have been conspicuous — simply a
man on his way to work; only
women slept late. However, Holly-
wood was off-limits to every male.
The city was not only the seat of
the Directorate, but the manufac-
turing center for the cosmetics in-
dustry. And since that gave women
her charm, it was a business no
man worked at.

George had to have a disguise.
He stopped on a residential street,
where the people were still likely to
be in their beds. He read names on
mail boxes until he found a house
where an unmarried woman lived.
He had no way of knowing if she
had a husband on approval with
her, but the box was marked
"Miss." With any luck he might
have got what he wanted without
disturbing her, but the woman was
a light sleeper and she caught him
as he was putting on the dress. He
was sorry he had to slug her, but
she gave him no resistance. A spark
of hope, a spark of long-forgotten
youth glowed in her eyes; before
she slid into unconsciousness.

Wearing the stolen dress, which
fit him like a tent, and an enor-
mous hat to hide his face, George
parked his sedan near the Direc-

IRVING E. COX, JR.

torate and entered the building
when it opened at eight. In room
after room automatons demonstrat-
ed how to dress correctly; robot
faces displayed the uses of cos-
metics. There were displays of kit-
chen gadgets, appliances, and other
heavy machinery for the home; re-
corded lectures on stock manage-
ment and market control. Here
women came from every part of
the country for advice, help and
guidance. Here the Top Directors
met to plan business policy, to gov-
ern the nation, and to supervise the
production of the compound. For
only the Top Directors — less than
a dozen women — actually knew the
formula. Like their stockholdings,
the secret was hereditary, passed
from mother to daughter.

George searched every floor of
the building, but found nothing ex-
cept exhibit rooms. Time passed,
and still he did not find what he
had come for. More and more
women crowded in to see the ex-
hibits. Several times he found new-
comers examining him oddly; he
found he had to avoid the crowds.

Eventually he went down steps
into the basement, though a door
marked "Keep Out." The door was
neither locked nor guarded, but
there was a remote chance it might
lead to the production center for
the compound. In the basement
George found a mechanical opera-
tion underway; at first he took it
for another cosmetic exhibit. Con-
veyor belts delivered barrels of fla-
voring syrup, alcohol and a widely
advertised liquid vitamin com-
pound. Machines sliced open the
containers, dumping the contents

LOVE STORY

into huge vats, from which pipes
emptied the mixture into passing
rows of bottles.

The bottles : suddenly George rec-
ognized them and the truth
dawned on him, sickeningly. Here
was the manufacturing center for
the compound— but it might just
as well have been a barn in Con-
necticut or a store window in Man-
hattan. No man was enslaved by
the compound, for the compound
did not exist. He was imprisoned
by his own sense of guilt, his own
fear of being different. George re-
membered his own fear and guilt:
he knew how much a man could be
driven to make himself conform to
what he thought other men were
like.

His revenge was as foolish as the
sham he wanted to destroy. He
should have reasoned that out long
ago; he should have realized it was
impossible to have immunity to an
addictive drug. But, no, George be-
lieved what he saw on the television
programs. He was victimized as
much as any man had ever been.

He turned blindly toward the
stairway, and from the shadows in
the hall the Morals Squad closed in
around him. With a final gesture of
defiance, he ripped ofT the stolen
dress and the absurd hat, and stood
waiting for the blast from their
guns. An old woman, wearing the
shoulder insignia of a Top Direc-
tor, pushed through the squad and
faced him, a revolver in her hand.
She was neither angry nor dis-
turbed. Her voice, when she spoke,
was filled with pity. Pity! That was
the final indignity.

"Now you know the truth," she

109

said. "A few men always have to
try it; and we usually let them see
this room and find out for them-
selves before — before we close the
case."

Tensely he demanded, "Just
how much longer do you think — "

"We can get away with thus? As
long as men are human beings. It's
easier to make yourself believe a lie
if you think everyone else believes
it, than to believe a truth you've
found out on your own. All of us
want more than anything else to
be like other people. Women have
created a world for you with tele-
vision programs; you grow up ob-
serving nothing else; you make
yourself fit into the pattern. Only a
few independent-minded charac-
ters have the courage to accept
their own immunity; most of them
end up here, trying to do some-
thing noble for the rest of man-
kind. But you have one satisfaction,
for what it's worth: you've been
true to yourself."

True to yourself. George found a
strange comfort in the words, and
his fear was gone. He squared his
shoulders and faced the mouth of
her gun. True to yourself : that was
something worth dying for.

He saw a flicker of emotion in
the old woman's eyes. Admiration?
He couldn't be sure. For at the
moment a shot rang out from the
end of the corridor; and the Top
Director fell back, nursing a hand
suddenly bright with blood.

"Let him go." It was Jenny's
voice. She was sheltered by a part-
ly open door at the foot of the stair-
way.

"Don't be a fool," the old woman

110,

replied. "He's seen too much."

"It doesn't matter. Who would
believe him?"

"You're upset. You don't real-
ize—"

"He's mine and I want him."

"The Directorate will give you
a refund of the purchase price."

"You didn't understand me. I
don't want one of your pretty au-
tomatons; anybody can buy them
for a few shares of stock. I want a
man — a real man; I want to be-
long to him."

"He belongs to you; you bought
bim."

"And that's what's wrong. We
really belong to each other."

The old woman glanced at
George and he saw the same flick-
er of feeling in her eyes. And tears,
tears of regret. Why? "We have
you outnumbered," the old woman
said quietly to Jenny.

"I don't care. I have a gun; I'll
use it as long as I'm able."

The Morals Squad raised their
weapons. The Director shook her
head imperiously and they snapped
to attention again. "If you take
him from us," she called out to
Jenny, "you'll be outlawed. We'll
hunt you down, if we can."

"I want him," Jenny persisted.
"I don't care about the rest of it."

The old woman nodded to
George. He couldn't believe that
she meant it. The Director was on
her home ground, in her head-
quarters building, backed by an
armed squad of stone-faced Ama-
zons. She had no reason to let him

She walked beside him as he
moved down the hall. When they

IRVING E. COX, JR.

were twenty feet from the guard,
she closed her thin hand on his
arm; her eyes swam with tears and
she whispered, "There truly is a
love potion. Not this nonsense we
bottle here, but something real and
very worthwhile. You and this girl
have found it. I know that, from
the way she talks. She doesn't say
anything about ownership, and
that's as it should be. As it has to
be, for any of us to be happy. Hold
tight to that all the rest of your
life. Don't ever believe in words;
don't fall for any more love stories;
believe what you feel deep inside —
what you know yourself to be true.

"You men who learn how to
break away are our only hope, too.
Most of us don't see that yet. I do;
I know what it used to be like.
Someday there may be enough men
with the stamina to take back the
place of dominance that we stole
from them. We thought we wanted
it; for decades before we had been
screaming about women's rights."
Her thin lips twisted in a sneer and
she spat her disgust. "Finally we
took what we wanted, and it turned
to ashes in our hands. We made our
men playthings; we made them
slaves. And after that they weren't
men any more. But what we stole
isn't the sort of thing you can hand
back on a silver platter; you men
have to get enough courage to take
it away from us."

Her grip tightened on his arm.
"There's a fire door at the end of
the hall ; if you push the emergency
button, you'll close it. That will
give you a five or ten minute start.
I can't help you any more . . ."

They were abreast of Jenny. She

LOVE STORY

seized Jenny's hand and thrust it
into his. "Beat it, kids; there's a
bachelor camp on the north ridge.
You can make it.

"And from here on in, what he
says goes," the old woman added.
"Don't forget that."

"She won't," George answered,
supremely self-assured.

He took Jenny's arm and, turn-
ing abruptly, they made their break
for freedom. The Director man-
aged to remain standing in the
middle of the corridor, making a
dangerous target of herself so that
none of the Morals Squad could
risk a shot at the fugitives. As the
fire door clanged shut George
looked back. He saw the old wom-
an's lips moving in silent prayer.

AT LAST!

A 1956 Calendar designed specifically
for Science Fiction Fans and Space
Flight Enthusiasts. Each month takes
you on an expedition to one of the
planets or moons of the Solar Sys-
tem, from Sun-baked Mercury to
Frigid Pluto.

• 12 two-color illustrations

• Scientifically-accurate text
with each illustration

• Wonderful for your den

• Printed in limited edition

• Only $1.00 postpaid

NOVA STUDIOS

P.O. Box 5201 -E
Minneapolis 7, Minnesota

Endorsed by The Society for the
Advancement of Space Travel

111

THE ODD GENRE

(Continued from page 3)

Otto) Binder, Dr. Keller, Hugo
Gemsback, Ray Cummings et al.

In retrospect Russell was amused
at how the year 1955 had once held
such a fatal fascination for him as
a far distant year of mystery, glam-
or, excitement; when robots would
be walking the streets, the Trans-
Atlantic Tunnel would be a reality,
and stratorockets would ply the
transpolar route, 90 minutes from
New York to London.

I must confess that 21 years ago,
when I attended the first meeting
of the Los Angeles Science Fantasy
Society (then chapter #4 of the
S.F. League), I scarcely thought
that I'd be attending most of the
nearly 950 meetings thru the years
to come and be Master of Cere-
monies (shy guy and tongue-tied
introverted youth that I was in
those days) at the Adult Anniver-
sary meeting. But the Hallowe'en
meeting of the LASFS — oldest s.f.
organization in existence — was its
21st birthday, and I'm sure I'll be
at the 1000th meeting and the
quarter century mark as well. A sa-
lute to my pal Russ Hodgkins, Aus-
tralian-bom fan who's the only
other charter member of the club
who's a "survivor" to today. And
the Anniversary meeting itself was
a humdinger, with the SRO sign
hung out. Mark Clifton, Ed Clin-
ton, Kris Neville, Mel Sturgis, Ar-
thur J. and Wm. D. Cox, Henry
Lee and Frank Quattrocchi were
among the pro's present as Direc-
trix Helen Urban, herself a selling
sci-fi writer, banged the oaken

gavel to call the memorable meet-
ing together. A large number of
congratulatory telegrams were re-
ceived from around the world,
among them: "A TWENTY-ONE
GUN SALUTE TO THE
L.A.S.F.S. SIGNED: CAPT. NE-
MO, SECY OF THE NAVY"
(Jules Verne's Navy, that is).
"Congratulations on 21st Anniver-
sary. I predict club meetings in fu-
ture will take place regularly each
week-day evening falling between
Wednesday and Friday. — Nostra
Damus." Signed Sincerely Yours,
"NO OTHER SCIENCE FIC-
TION CLUB IN THE WORLD
CAN HOLD A CANDELABRA
TO YOUR RECORD. FRITZ
LIEBERACE." "/ have never en-
countered a more loyal, kind, con-
siderate; well-behaved, intelligent,
morally straight and physically
strong group, and my keeper says
it's time for my electric shock treat-
ment now. — Robespierre Bloch."
"AMAZED AT LASFS REACH-
ING ITS MAJORITY. OFFER
$50,000 FOR FIRST SERIAL
RIGHTS TO YOUR UNEX-
PURGATED MINUTES. CORN-
FED-DENTAL MAGAZINE."

'ROUND-THE-WORLD Round-up:

France: Jules Verne's "From the
Earth to the Moon" to be filmed.

Italy: 100th issue of beautiful
hiweekly sci-fi magazine, Urania,
published.

Mexico: GIGANTURO, an
original scientifilm script by Frank
Quattrocchi, to be produced here
in widescreen and technicolor.

That's All, Folks.

111

Wnaf Is Your Science I. Q.?

OCIENCE-FIGTION is not confined to realms of space. To
O make sure you catch on the next time the hero is a "down to
earth" scientist, test yourself on this quiz. Count 5 for each cor-
rect answer. A score of 80 is excellent! Answers on page 71.

1. The best conductor of electricity among the metals is .

\ 2. What is another name for a magnetic resonance accelerator?

3. The lighter a gas the more it diffuses. ;

4. Who originated the theory of probability?

5. A positron is a particle having the same mass and magnitude
of charge as .

6. What is the term used to describe the changing of the speed
of a reaction brought about by the introduction of a con-
tact agent?

7. The density of sea water is proportional to its tem- <

perature and increases with salinity.

' 8. How many calories of heat are required for ice to change

each gram of water at its melting point? [

9. 33,000 foot-pounds of work per minute are equal to ■ —

horsepower. '

10. What term is used to describe the form of reproduction in
which a female cell reproduces without fertilization by a
male cell?

11. Bottom waters of the ocean in all latitudes approach

degrees Fahrenheit.

il2. In which direction do light waves vibrate in relation to the
direction in which they are traveling?

13. Standard pressure for scientific observations is established at

; pounds per square inch. I

14. Which color of the spectrum has the shortest wave length?

15. Deuterium is a form of heavy .

I 16. How many B.T.U.'s of heat are required to raise the tem-
; perature of one pound of water one degree?

17. The velocity of sound increases about feet per second

I with every centigrade degree rise in the temperature of

I the air.

18. Which element is used as the unit of comparison for decid-
ing the valence numbers?

I 19. Radiosondes are used in the study of meteorology.

20. A Fahrenheit degree is equal to of a centigrade de-
gree.

^ ^^^".^^lir -4^ ■^ ^-^^^■s^ ^^ ■^■^^■^^■^■^^t'-^ ^^^ n ^^^^-^ts^*^^ ^i^ ^ 1^ ^.^ •^'■^ ^ ., I

113

THE EXECUTIONER

(Continued from page 45)

flicker that would give a split-sec-
ond warning of her next move.

The warning came, and he was
ahead of it. His shot struck Ann
high on the right shoulder. Her
second and last bullet ploughed in-
to the dust midway between them.
She twisted around from the force
of the impact, and half slipped,
half fell from the pedestal. But she
kept herself erect, bracing against
the pedestal with her left hand. A
red blotch was spreading from her
shoulder to her breast and down
her side. There was shock and pain
in her eyes, but the half-smile was
still on her lips.

"Une!" shouted the crowd,
counting his first shot.

Jacques no longer needed a will
of his own. The momentum of a
thousand deaths swept him along,
overpowering everything else.

"Deux!" screamed the hundred
thousand voices. "Deux! Deux!"

His second shot struck Ann well
below the left shoulder, knocking
her away from the support of the
pedestal, sprawling her in the dust.
Yet so indomitable was her will
that she brought her hands together
and raised herself to her knees. Her
entire upper body was covered with
dust and spreading fingers of crim-
son.

"Trois!" shrieked the maddened
crowd. "Trois! Trois!"

Women tore away pieces of their
clothing and waved them with
savage abandon.

"Trois! Trois! Trois!"

The third shot could barely be

heard. Ann was lifted from her
knees and hurled backwards. She
rolled over twice, then lay face
downward, her fingers digging in
the hard earth.

With his last shot, the fierceness
drained out of Jacques. He blinked
like a man awakening from a hor-
rible dream. He stared at Ann's
shuddering body, not believing he
could have done this. He cried out
to her, and ran to her side with
great, lunging steps. His body shook
with dry sobs.

He turned her over tenderly,
smoothed back the tangled hair
from her forehead, tried to wipe
some of the dirt and bubbles of red
from her lips.

An FBIT man rushed toward
them with a microphone. With one
terrible look, Jacques sent him
scurrying back.

"Ann . . . Ann . . ." he cried.
"What have I done?"

Her glazing, pain-filled eyes
cleared for a moment, and drew
him closer. In them, for all the
pain, there was peace at last. No
reproach, no disappointment. Only
peace. And he knew then, what he
should always have known: That
when a man lived as one with
Death, he could not give less to any
person, nor expect more.

Ann's fingers crawled through
the dust and touched the toe of his
boot. Her quivering lips twisted in
a final grimace of ecstacy. And out
of the lonely void of the dying came
the words he had always hoped to
hear, and would never hear again:

"Good night," she whispered.
"You — were wonderful — ^my lover
— ^my husband." • • •

114

SCIENCE

BRIEFS

Dream cars of the future will have
practically trouble-free motors. Ex-
periments have proved that gas tur-
bine engines are simpler and more
rugged and will burn almost any
liquid fuel including kerosene and
cheap diesel oil. The new motor,
which operates on the pinwheel
principle, is inherently simple, with
none of the clutch and shift jerks
felt even in modern cars with auto-
matic transmissions. The engine has
few parts, only one of which re-
quires workmanship to close toler-
ances. The only real moving part is
the turbine, an efficient fan that
converts jet blasts to turning mo-
tion. It is easy to take apart and
put together and packs more
power per pound of engine than
the piston engine of today.

Even telegraph operators can be re-
placed by machines. An electronic
device is now ready that can trans-
late international Morse code sig-
nals from radio beeps into typed
copy. The robot radioman can han-
dle signals produced by hand or
machine keying and overcomes a
major problem by automatically
adjusting itself to different speeds
of transmission. It can even com-

pensate for the sender's change of
pace within a single message.

A new solar cooker folds up like an
umbrella for carrying, but inverted
in the sun it becomes so effective in
concentrating the sun's heat that
hot dogs can be roasted at the
"handle" heat focus. The fabric of
the cooker is a special reflecting
plastic. Picnickers of tomorrow
will be able to carry the cooker
with them on a sunny day and pre-
pare lunch without fuel or flame.

Pilots in Australia are being
trained to fly planes that catch fall-
ing parachute-borne rockets in mid-
air. When the rockets begin to fall,
a parachute opens. A plane with a
500-foot paravane trailing slightly
to one side then flies alongside the
falling missile, and grapnels on the
paravene cable grip on a cable
trailing from the parachute. The
"catch" is played like a fish on the
line and the plane flies down a
gully spanned by cables so that the
rocket is transferred from the para-
vane to a cable, where it swings
until collected.

Antibiotic-burgers may be on the
menu at the local diner soon. The
presence of small amounts of aureo-
mycin will keep hamburger meat
from spoiling several days longer
than meat kept under refrigeration.
Experimenters have found that as
little as ten parts of the antibiotic
to a million parts of hamburger
keeps the meat in good condition
for at least ten days. The process
is not yet commercially usable
since the effects of the aureomycin

115

on humans eating the meat has not
yet been thoroughly studied.

Evidence that the anti-proton ac-
tually exists was recently an-
nounced by the A. E.G. The nega-
tively charged particle was created
in the bevatron at the University
of California, Berkeley. There is no
known "practical" application of
the anti-proton discovery; but it
does verify the electrical charge
symmetry of nature — for each
known charged particle there is a
particle of equal mass with opposite
charge. A new era of nuclear re-
search, rivaling that which led to
the atomic bomb, is foreseen as a
result of this anti-proton creation.

An aerial uranium detector de-
signed for one-man pilot prospec-
tors has been developed. The 17-
pound scintillation counter has an
automatic alarm that signals the
pilot whenever an anomaly is
passed. The counter can also be
provided with a strip chart pen
recorder and two indicating meters.

Air "traffic cops" will need more
and more radar to keep up with
the mammoth air jam envisioned
in the next ten years. The Civil
Aeronautics Commission has a ten-
year program set up to loosen the
jam. This includes a secondary
radar beacon system with an air-
borne device that returns signals so
strong they can penetrate rain and
fog. More important, the device
returns a coded impulse for posi-
tive indentification of the plane.
The new set up should be ready for
installation early in 1957.

116

Trackless wastelands will be broad
highways for a new truck-train
with huge balloon-like tires. The
cross country carrier can criss-
cross the deserts, glide through
jungles and roll over arctic snow
without bogging down. Cars in the
train are connected mechanically
by a steering arrangement that
makes every car follow the tracks
of the lead truck. The train can
climb steeper inclines than an auto
and can, roll smoothly over stumps
and ditches. Tires on the cars
range up to ten feet in height.

An automatic "seek-and-kill" sys-
tem for submarine torpedoes that
uses transistors instead of the con-
ventional vacuum tubes has been
developed. The new guided tor-
pedo system eliminates the need for
a thirty-second warm-up period be-
fore firing, uses less current and is
more compact. Developed by West-
inghouse Laboratories, the torpedo
guides itself toward the enemy tar-
get by means of ultrasonic sound
waves in the water.

The establishment of the first ci-
vilian skin bank was announced
recently. This followed on the heels
of the development of a new tech-
nique for grafting the skin from re-
cently dead bodies as a life-saving
measure for persons with severe
and extensive burns. When stored
at ordinary refrigerator tempera-
tures these post-mortem grafts can
be used as long as three weeks after
removal. The added factor of being
able to use larger and larger
patches with success has practically
eliminated the need for live donors.

SCIENCE BRIEFS

Sir:

Your World's Champion is a
fraud, if we judge by 1955 stand-
ards. Looky there, brass knuckles,
wrist spikes and a bikini boxing
outfit . . . and not a scar! Meix
Factor and Pare Westmore should
live so long ... or do such a cover
up job. I can only conclude that
their 2155 equivalents have never
been near her. I am also forced to
conclude that this is her first, last
and only defense of her champion-
ship, she having originally won it
by sending in write-in votes on
Krispy-Krunchy boxtops. She's an
ad agency promotion discovered by
a talent scout while sitting on a
drugstore stool in Cornpone, Ky.
The annual contest ended last week
at Atlantic City and oil wells were
awarded to runners up. Sales of
Krispy Krunchies have quadrupled.

The Champion will defend her
title against a specially designed

robot made by the Azimov Posi-
tronic Robot Foundry. She will win
by a knockout after 40 seconds of
the 8th round when the robot re-
sponds to an electronic impulse and
collapses to the canvas in a welter
of slipped gears and worn condens-
ers, she will be awarded a size 24
champion's belt, which will later
be displayed on 30 nationally tele-
vised coast-to-coast spectaculars.
Her retirement will consist of 10
weeks at the Palace Theater, a 5
year recording contract, a short-
term movie contract and a 29 week
contract with T.V. awarding the
mink coats on giveaway programs.
She will marry a man three times
her age, cheat him of his longevity
shots, and buy a planet of the Vega
system as a gilt-edged investment.
— Bob Pilkington
Louisville, Ky.

Dear Editor:

I am impressed and intrigued by
the lack of intelligence in the faces
on your cover ... I see this as a
symbol of a time when Man has
forgotten the basic laws for civil-
ized existence, a world declining,
retrogressing, without love and
with too much leisure; an irreli-
gious, heartless, deadly, insensible
world moving backward in terms
of intelligence and callous far be-
yond the point of brutality. If we
make the assumption that a regime
such as that of the communists has
overrun the earth, subjugating man
and bringing intellectual chaos,
then the cover is more than pos-
sible.

— Mervin Chapman
Key West, Fla.

117

The writers of the two preceding
letters were awarded $5 each for
their thoughts on our December
cover. Three other awards went to
Orma McCormick of Ferndale,
Mich., John Murphy of Jersey
City, New Jersey, and J. Frank
Gamble of Littleton, Colorado . . .
Comments on the gal with the
brass knucks were varied and in-
teresting indeed and we wish we
had room to run more of them.

Dear Sir:

I flatly think that sexy covers are
the reason that s-f isn't skyrocket-
ing to greater popularity. When the
average individual throws his 35c
on the counter he undoubtedly has
an urge to hide the covers. You
have a readable magazine and I
give science-fiction the credit for
my choosing Physics as my college
major. My only complaint is those
covers. Can't s-f editors be a little
subtle — the drawings usually
scream of poor taste.

— W. G. Cantrell
Bryan, Texas

Sirs:

Interstellar colonization seems to
be the most hopeful subject for the
s-f readers of today, yet authors al-
ways assume that other races will
be either so far ahead of us that
they are dead or so far behind us
that we will have to "civilize" them.
I agree that the chances of an-
other exactly at our own level is a
probability that's astronomical con-
sidering the differences in time,
temperature, physiology etc. that
are involved. Considering the for-
mer highly civilized group, why

haven't we met them yet? They
must have passed through the ex-
ploratory stage somewhere along
the line. We've argued the point pro
and con and come up with several
proposed explanations.

1. The supermen are here, but so
smart we haven't found any
traces.

2. Habitable planets are so rare
they can't find each other.

3. Interstellar travel is so difficult
that races are confined to a few
light-years from their home
planet.

4. The extermination theory: the
cultural level necessary for star
travel makes race suicide inevi-
table.

What I'm after is an answer
from your readers who I'm sure
have given it a deal of thought
themselves. Or at least an esti-
mated percentage of how many
numbers of readers believe which
theory would be of interest to all
s-f fans.

Would you let the readers use
the letter column for a sounding
board?

— J. G. Hickman
Park Forest, 111.

Delighted! We'll go a step far-
ther and propound a fifth explana-
tion: Could it be that we really are
the first and most highly civilized
race?

Dear Editor:

IF was my ideal, unfortunately
this state of affairs was not to last.
"Hue and Cry" has reared its ugly
head. A trespasser from the pulp
field. You were original with

118

"What's Your Science I.Q.?",
'^Science Briefs" and "Worth Cit-
ing", so why retrogress? I'm con-
vinced that a number of those in
favor of letter columns are more
interested in getting their names
in print than in constructive criti-
cism. Apart from "Hue and Cry"
keep it as is — it's great.

— W. J. Allen
Calgary, Alberta

We hate to disagree and don't
feel that we publish the "pulpy"
sort of letter. If we can have good
arguments and slices of interesting
ideas, we enjoy the stimulation.
I hereby appoint "Hue and Cry"
the sounding board for this contro-
versy, in the hopes that a solution
will be found.

Sirs:

Perhaps someday we can build
machines that have all the func-
tions of a human; would these ma-
chines be competitors of ours?
Should we scrap all machines now
lest we become their slaves? I don't
think so. It may be paradoxical,
but the more we understand about
machine thinking, the more we un-
derstand about human thinking.
With a greater understanding of
ourselves, we can ensure that the
role of the machine is a beneficent
one. I have a deep conviction that
a vastly humbled and chastened —
but improved! — humanity will re-
sult from the effort to teach a ma-
chine what Man believes. The
tough part will be that Man will
have to find out exactly what he
believes — and make sense out of it.
— K. L. Hamilton
Walton, Mass.

Wouldn't you like to stick around a
few thousand years and find out?
It's a new approach: instead of the
computers solving the problems —
they will force man to solve them
himself.

Dear Mr. Quinn:

Although a reader of s-f for
about 8 years, I've never felt the
urge to write to an editor before
now. What did it? Jerry Bixby's
Laboratory, that's what. The rel-
atively few attempts at humor in
s-f have made me glad that they
were few they have been of such
low quality. In my opinion Labora-
tory is far and away the best piece
of humorous s-f I've read. I also
enjoyed the other yams.

— George Thome
Detroit, Mich.

NEVER,
EVER BEFORE,
ANYWHERE!

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119

CHROME PASTURES

(Continued from page 97)

Gethsemane through the trees. It
was blood-red in the morning sun-
light.

"Ten seconds — "

There wasn't going to be time
enough to save Linda from the
backwash, but there was time
enough to try —

"Five seconds — "

No, not even time enough to try.

"Two seconds — "

Brett breasted the hill just as the
Gethsemane blasted. He reeled
back, blinded by the jets, deafened
by their thunder. When the after-
image faded he saw the brief morn-
ing star in the sky and he felt the
first tearing pangs of his loss.

"How did you know I'd be
here?" Linda said.

Brett turned around, not believ-
ing at first. She had just stepped
from a sheltering stand of locusts.
She was crying.

"I saw you on the telecast," he
said. "I thought — "

She shook her head. "You can't
fight anything by running away
from it," she said. "One useless
sacrifice is enough."

She swayed and Brett leaped for-
ward and caught her arm. "I'm all
right," she said. She looked into his
eyes and seemed surprised at what
she saw there. "I thought you'd
hate me," she said.

"I can't hate you," Brett said.
"You can't hate someone when
you already love them."

She looked up at the sky. "I'll
get him back," she said. "Somehow,
some way. Will you help me?"

"Of course I'll help you."
They walked down the hill to-
gether. When they reached the
highway the Seneca was burning
brightly. Linda gasped. Brett took
a slow deep breath. It was the most
beautiful fire he had ever seen.

A long time ago Thoreau said:
"We do not ride the railroad; it
rides upon us." It remained for the
wife of an unemployed steelworker
to paraphrase that statement. In
her best-selling social novel, The
Highways of Hell (Brandt & Payne,
2060), Linda Dalms Brett wrote:
"We do not drive our cars; our cars
drive us."

Civilizations decay from within.
Sometimes the decay goes unno-
ticed for years, manifesting itself
only through reactions of the sub-
conscious. But it is there, weaken-
ing the social structure to a point
where the slightest impetus can
send that structure toppling.

The Highways of Hell afforded
that impetus, and the sacred au-
tomobile fell from its pedestal. It be-
came a mere vehicle again, with a
tyrannical governor that said 30
mph and meant it. As a mere
vehicle it could not of course jus-
tify the stern laws enacted to protect
it in its former glory, and conse-
quently those laws were modified.
This resulted in amnesty for some
tens of thousands of prisoners serv-
ing sentences on the Foundation
planets, among them a man who
once believed himself to be
Christ. . .

— ^Bethe Royale
MASS MOTIVATIONS

120

— confinued from Sack Cover

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